I’ll start by clarifying what this debate is about. As it says in the description, this debate is pretty generalized, focusing on “whether or not all democracies ought to adopt the same framework where every citizen is compelled to vote.” This isn’t a question of specific policies, though I will present the uniting features such policies should entail, nor is it about any single country or region. It’s a topic that covers democracies as a whole with explicit recognition of the variety therein. I recognize that not all democracies are built identically and, especially given that they are democracies and thus systems of government built by the people for the people, the specifics of how voting mandates are designed and implemented should be laid out by elected representatives. To that end, while these elements do need some clarification, the inherent barriers to implementing mandatory voting are not. This is an “ought” resolution, so the focus is on whether the outcomes of implementing mandatory voting is better than the outcomes of voluntary voting systems.
Also of note is the shared burdens in this debate. Both mandatory and voluntary voting systems exist in democracies in the world today. Both my opponent’s and my positions are equal and opposite: we must show that, on balance, either the mandatory (me) or voluntary (Magoroth) voting system are better for democracies worldwide.
With that, I’ll move into my model.
There’s a lot here, but this is meant to specify a very simple case: democracies should implement compulsory voting with clear enforcement mechanisms and remove impediments to voting.
A couple of important notes.
My framework is democratic legitimacy.
Democracies are granted legitimacy by the whole population - not a subset thereof, not a sliver of the voting public, but by the entirety of it. The government of any democracy is, by definition, meant to represent the interests of the entire population, not just the most outspoken and invested. A more representative democracy is inherently more healthy and legitimate, recognizing the will of the whole electorate and not just a more vocal, often fringe minority.
That legitimacy is essential to how democracies function: citizens accept that the government they elect has authority, which fosters stability and compliance with laws. It’s the reason we submit to paying taxes and the reason most of us aren’t out in the streets with torches and pitchforks (I can’t speak for Steve). By casting ballots and going through the laborious and time-consuming process of counting them and tallying the results, citizens vest trust in their government to make difficult choices. Lower participation reduces that trust and thus results in a democracy that functionally doesn’t represent nor earn the recognition of the people.
With that established, my case breaks down to three interconnected points.
1. Mandatory voting increases turnout
Voter turnout in elections has declined substantially over the course of previous decades, leading to disengagement and apathy with the political system. Ironically, “as democracy has expanded across countries, electoral participation has declined… The poorest are least likely to participate in the democratic process, and this is particularly true when overall participation is low. Low and unequal turnout then leads to ever more excluded communities with politicians engaging with the groups they perceive to be their active supporters.”
A fine is a strong incentive for people to cast their ballots, ergo more people in democracies will do so. “A few studies in countries as diverse as Switzerland, Brazil, and Australia have shown that even with small fines for non-voting or low enforcement of penalties, electoral participation is significantly higher under compulsory voting.” Voter turnout per country is often higher than those with entirely voluntary voting, with outliers like Greece showcasing the effects of unenforced penalties.
2. Increased turnout improves representation
Politicians need to get elected, and the more voters there are from a broader swath of the population, the more people those same politicians have to court and subsequently represent in office. A mandatory voting system means they can no longer rely on “likely voters” to buoy them into office. Those representatives should have to court disaffected and apathetic voters and find ways to make them care enough to vote for them.
Mandatory voting would also bolster voters. “[The requirement to vote] sends a clear message that there are rights and responsibilities. You have an obligation as a member of society: we’re all in this thing, and you can’t be a bystander.” Voting is active participation in the process of building and re-tooling the makeup of a government, and just as we are all compelled to pay taxes for the purpose of funding essential government functions, voters should be compelled to vote to ensure that the same government is at its most democratic. This would especially benefit disadvantaged groups that often don’t show up for elections, including women, minorities, and working-class citizens.
3. Improved representation legitimizes democracy
By adhering to the social contract inherent to all democracies and emphasizing the importance of every eligible voter playing an active role in the outcome of an election, we create a system that engenders more citizen buy-in since the outcomes (e.g. laws and policies of that government) comport better with a larger subset of the electorate. That yields a more stable government representing a more equal distribution of the population. That stability is crucial, since a government that fails to represent the people leads to more disaffection, resulting in lower turnout as apathy spreads. And this effect is worse among the poor, with the vast majority of the drop in voter turnout attributed to them, engendering huge rifts between socioeconomic classes and further weakening social connections.
This can also lead to the collapse of democratic institutions and lead to the erosion of democracies. This is particularly bad for fledgling democracies like those in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, which have seen the steepest declines in voter turnout. Many of these countries have effectively ceased to be democracies, falling to authoritarianism. As such, younger democracies would benefit most from mandatory voting, which sets the standard for engagement and establishes the legitimacy of their elected representatives early.
I welcome my opponent's case.
I welcome my opponent and I too look forward to this debate. An interesting topic.
I’ll begin by briefly stating that Pro addressed one of the issues I was thinking about prior to them posting their argument; namely, that of protest votes. I think it would be both fundamentally immoral and in a weird way also undemocratic for someone to be forced to vote for a candidate (any candidate, even), under certain circunstances. Imagine having to pick between Hitler and Stalin. Who do I pick? In a mandatory voting system that disallowed non-votes, people would be forced to break the law to vote with their conscience; in addition, those who wouldn’t go as far as breaking the law (which would likely be a substantial proportion of those who would otherwise have stayed home on election day), would have to legitimise either one of two (or more) absolutely terrible choices, and would undermine Pro’s point about mandatory voting strengthening democratic representation. I think Pro has proven that at minimum, mandatory voting should allow citizens not to vote.
However, I do not necessarily agree with the rest of my opponent’s points. I will address the points which I believe are at the heart of my opponent’s disagreement.
Firstly, Pro states that mandatory voting increases turnout. This is evidently true, but is this a good thing? Consider the type of person who is now being forced to vote. I argue that forcing turnouts will not induce people into doing more research before casting their vote. Many people who aren’t voting are likely politically disinterested and probably don’t pay much attention to politics.
Take the average teenager, for instance. Who will they vote for? Depending on if their parents are politically inclined or not, they may vote on nothing more than parental influence. Some will vote for a candidate just because their parents support that candidate, some for the opposite reason (as a rebellion sort of thing). This undermines democratic legitimacy because a vote will be cast which will be based on nothing but someone’s whims, and could easily be “the wrong” vote so to speak (I have not done this and I will not unless my opponent asks me clarify, but my position is that certain votes are 100%, objectively, the wrong vote to cast. I assume my opponent also holds this position so I won’t go any further into proving this).
I do not necessarily believe that just teenagers would be doing this. It is probable that this would happen regardless of age, it would simply be more pronounced in that group.
So in short my position here is that mandatory voting would force those who shouldn’t be voting into casting a vote, with unfavourable consequences for society.
Secondly, I’d like to point out that voting turnouts have been decreasing worldwide for several decades. Take Quebec for instance. It is now 60% where in the past it was much higher. This point I am trying to make is about the current situation, although it should apply in most relevant cases because mandatory voting is a (rather dire) solution that is proposed only when turnouts are low; if turnouts were high there would be minimal effect and there would be little reason to propose them, except for moral reasons (society viewing voting and/or political participation as a moral obligation, for instance).
I will first briefly state why I consider the solution to be dire; namely, it is because it is tantamount to forcing the individual to do something against their will, using the state apparatus. I argue that any society that does this is immoral. This is not the basis of a liberal sysem; in a liberal system, people are mostly free to do as they please, except when that directly infringes on someone else’s ability to do as they please in a way that the victim is unable to defend themselves against (think murder, robbery, etc). My opponent suggests fines for not going to vote. Okay, all well and good. But… if I don’t actually want to vote for anyone, why do I have to go to the ballot or even submit a mail-in ballot that says “hey politicians, go fuck yourselves”? It makes no difference in the end since I am doing the same thing; not voting. So why not skip the middlework and just let me stay home?
Back to a more relevant point, since this previous point was somewhat more nebulous and harder to argue against. My second main point is that instead of requiring mandatory voting - which, I have argued would simply muddy the waters of which party is most preferred, in addition to adding a bunch of voters who will cast their vote for stupid reasons (which could easily be abused by the most rhetorical or charming speakers rather than the best candidate - something which is already an issue with normal voting but would become an even larger one with mandatory voting), that political parties just get better at representing people’s wants and needs.
This is a rather complicated issue that is hard to debate since I can see many reasons why they aren’t representing interests properly; first, parties have started talking about either extreme, abstract, or irrelevant things, the people in the general populace who could represent issues that the average person actually cares about (I do not define average person to be working class; I am talking here about shit like climate change, which if you disbelieve climate change to be real, as I do, then to you that topic is completely irrelevant and talking about effectively nothing).
But, in brief, parties should just get better at representing the populace, or there need to be new parties. This would solve the turnout issue without forcing people to do anything.
Having to force people to do something is, in general, a sign that your solution is really last resort and you can’t do anything else.
One last main point I would add, which follows from my second point, is that mandatory voting benefits the main or dominant parties the most, since they are old and they have been in the public’s mind for years, and, as I said before, it is their failure that makes us even consider mandatory voting. It benefits their turnouts, not the hypothetical turnout of a hypothetically better party or group of parties. It may even serve as a screen for how much dissatisfaction there is with the current establishment; which would disincentivise people from establishing new ones; why try if you think there’s no chance?
I await my opponent’s case.
I’ll start by consolidating my points and then get into some rebuttals.
Con works with my democratic legitimacy framework and he doesn’t challenge my framing of it: that democracy is legitimized by a wider swath of the population voting in elections, and that only by maximizing the number of people who vote is trust vested in the results of those elections. He does present impacts that are tangentially related to democracy (e.g. freedom), but no way to weigh them.
I’ve also established and Con has conceded my solvency. The federal Election Day holiday (14% of the US electorate report being too busy or having a conflicting schedule) and automatic voter registration (in the US alone this would add up to 50 million people to the voter rolls) dovetail with the fine to increase voter turnout, which improves representation, which legitimizes democracy. Only compulsory voting can ”assure higher turnout virtually by itself”.
And the impacts of increased representation, specifically ensuring an equitable distribution of the population (as opposed to the differential turnout seen under voluntary voting), are substantial. In the US alone, “of the 63 million poor and low-income Americans who are eligible to vote, 34 million did not cast a ballot in the 2016 presidential election.” Preventing democratic breakdown addresses an even greater risk, since reduced voter turnout in many countries can and has resulted in authoritarian takeovers.
Onto Con’s arguments.
1. “The wrong vote[rs]”
Con puts two types of voters in this group: those who are uninformed and/or disinterested, and those who are easily swayed. Con argues that when these groups vote, theirs are “100%, objectively, the wrong vote to cast.”
A few responses.
First, whether it is a protest vote, a vote for an implausible candidate, or a vote for a major candidate, and for whatever reason, I’ll argue that none are objectively “wrong.” More legal participation in the democratic process is what makes that process healthy and legitimate, full stop. It is up to Con to demonstrate what “wrongness” is in this context, distinguish it from what is “right” or “correct,” and explain how it negatively impacts democratic legitimacy.
Second, all voters are variably informed, variably interested, and variably manipulable. People generally aren’t quizzed at polling stations on knowledge of or bias towards the candidates, nor on who informed your selection. These are nonunique to both voluntary and mandatory voting systems. Con claims that there will be “unfavorable consequences for society” (unclear what those are) resulting from “forcing those who shouldn’t be voting into casting a vote.” At best, this indicates that voluntary voting systems restrict these issues to a smaller population of voters who exhibit buy-in. Con will have to demonstrate that that population is less prone to “wrong” voting. At worst, voluntary voting systems are built to exclude voters, telling them as Con has that they “shouldn’t be voting", thus validating their apathy. This combined with reducing opportunities to vote and erecting roadblocks like registration is the antithesis of democratic legitimacy by discouraging participation in the democratic process. Con will have to justify how society benefits from these exclusionary practices.
Third, a mandatory system addresses these issues. Eligible voters are required to bear the responsibility of voting, they can no longer act as bystanders. The system demands buy-in. Mandatory voting also increases participation of uniquely disadvantaged groups, whose concerns are so thoroughly dismissed in voluntary voting systems that they feel disaffected and disengaged. Adding so many of their voices at once empowers them to make changes and shift representation to include them.
2. Mandatory voting is a “dire solution”
I’ll concede that shifting from a voluntary system to a mandatory one takes away an eligible voter’s right to choose whether to cast a ballot. That is a given.
Con frames this as a “dire solution,” defining that as “forcing the individual to do something against their will,” and that no one should be forced to do anything “except when that directly infringes” on the rights of others.
The word “dire” implies an unprecedented or at least unwarranted breach of rights, yet as I previously mentioned, we are compelled to pay taxes, which demand that individuals surrender both freedom and property. Freedoms can be and are abridged to ensure proper function of the government in democracies the world over. Ensuring democratic legitimacy is just as if not more important than keeping the lights on, and is only sufficiently achieved via mandate. Con will have to show that mandate harms democratic legitimacy or argue that there is some competing value that is more important, not just insinuate that it is nebulously “immoral” because it goes against "a liberal system," especially when that liberal system is contingent on democratic legitimacy.
Con also argues that to protest vote is functionally identical to not voting.
A protest vote is still participation, tangible evidence that the existing government and electoral system have fallen short. These can and do have dramatic effects on elections, shaping political narratives and highlighting lacking representation. Nonvoters, by contrast, represent an amalgamation of many reasons why one might choose not to vote. Only in a mandatory voting system are politicians consistently confronted with an engaged and diverse voting electorate that can support or reject them.
3. Mainly helps “main or dominant parties the most”
Con concludes that mandatory voting benefits only established parties because they are best known among the public.
This is false. A more equitable distribution of voters would necessarily change the demographics and policy focus of those voters. These are all voters who otherwise wouldn’t vote for anyone despite widespread knowledge of these candidates, so it doesn’t follow that they would all default to candidates who have upheld the very system that made them disaffected. If anything, the voluntary voting system ensures the dominance of these parties, as evidenced by the fact that those who volunteer continue to elect them. It is only through a seismic shift in the voting base (see: mandatory voting) that these parties could have to face meaningful competition.
4. Counterplan: just be more representative
Con argues that political parties should just become more representative of their constituents. This isn’t a competing model, it’s blue sky thinking without any explanation of the “how.” Political parties will change in unknown ways and/or add new parties in a wide range of democracies worldwide, becoming more representative. This is just solvency by fiat. The counterplan Con is proposing is too unclear to judge whether it would be effective. What changes would they make? How would those changes result in more representation? What prevents future changes that shift away from these measures?
Any system of voting would be improved by better representation, but mandatory voting creates an environment where those changes happen and stick around. “[C]ompulsion means that the battle is not, any more, to make sure that your supporters actually get to the polls, or to deter those of your opponents from doing so… but to ensure that of those who turn out, as many vote for you as possible.” It places the onus on parties to represent their constituents in their platforms first and foremost, and those same voters will hold political parties to task with their votes, whereas disaffected groups and minority interests would only become more vanishingly small in systems with voluntary voting.
Pro states that I work with the framework he established in his first argument. What he says with respect to democratic legitimacy seems fishy to me, and I’ll state that not voting can itself a vote of some kind; you are either okay with whatever happens, you dislike all choices, or you are simply not informed enough to make a choice. Note that in the hypothetical system Pro envisions, people would still be allowed to make all of these choices, BUT:
a) People are more likely to actually pick a candidate if they have to show up at the polling station. This basically slightly undermines legitimacy since some people are making a choice they would otherwise not be making at all. They may have a slight preference for a candidate; in the old system their nonvote would clearly have shown “I despise all these choices”, in the new one this would be masked. Other than Australia, what kind of countries that we can say are reasonable free and democratic countries make voting mandatory? Authoritarian ones. Note that mandatory voting was introduced in Australia, the only real example of a democratic country that uses this system, because a political party in the 20s there needed votes and they knew they could win if everyone voted.
It doesn’t seem to me like mandatory voting legitimises democracy. More like the opposite.
This also goes back to my original point that certain people should not be voting at all; this is not strictly restricted to class, welfare, or anything else Pro might imagine I meant when I said that (an unfair characterization on Pro’s part of my stance). Obviously, everyone should have the right to vote. But that right to vote also includes the right not to vote. If I am not informed enough on the candidates for whatever reason, I do not wish to vote. I can make that choice for myself and it would be better for everyone involved that I do so. Pro has not actually answered why I have to be dragged to the polling station to say “I do not wish to vote”.
This affects EVERYONE since potentially everyone can be uninformed on a set of candidates, at least once in their life. Yes, like I said allowing people to cast a blank ballot theoretically achieves this - but forcing people to show up to the poll makes it much more likely that they will vote even if they dislike both/all of the candidates. It’s a kind of soft coercion.
And, more importantly; I challenge Pro to claim that he wants people like Dan Quayle to vote. He can’t even properly spell the word “potato”, I don’t want that dumbass’ vote to count the same as mine. He’ll probably vote (assume Dan Quayle isn’t a politician and just some uninvolved guy, and you can be sure there are MANY Dan Quayles out there) for whoever strikes his fancy. Even if he votes for the same candidate as me, I do not want him voting. It casts an aspersion on my side and makes my side look dumb.
I am not advocating for making voting requirements stricter. I am saying people like Dan Quayle don’t even show up to the polling station if you don’t force them to; and, what Pro hasn’t actually said is - if you have to force someone to make a choice, especially in something as important as an election, are you sure you are going to like the choice they’ll be making?
Finally, Pro states that my point of making political parties more representative of the average voter is nebulous. How is it nebulous? What reason does Pro give for declining voter turnouts? Surely, it can’t be that everyone has gotten busier, right? There has to be a reason. I say that that reason is, quite obviously, and quite simply, that politicians have become worse, political choices have become a matter of picking between two piles of shit, one that’s diarrhetic and one that’s solid.
I would venture a very strong guess, nay, I would bet my weekly wage that a substantial majority of the people on this site (and, the populace in general) would agree me on this. Very probably even Pro himself agrees with me on this.
So, yes, mandatory voting is a useless measure at best. At worst, it makes political parties think they are much more important than they really are and that they’re dealing with issues properly. Which they aren’t. No mandatory voting, please. Make a rule that invalidates every single person currently in an elected office and force politicians to have a minimum of X years experience working in the private sector. Make taking tests mandatory for becoming a politician, like South Korea does. Force politicians to substantiate their claims when saying something in their capacity as a politician (sort of like libel/defamation laws), like Singapore does. I guarantee things would change dramatically without requiring something as ridiculous and authoritarian as mandatory voting, a literal Soviet and Communist principle (in my home country of Romania, during the Communist period voting was mandatory).
No counter-arguments have been posted yet.
