What Would Happen If America Made Voting Mandatory?

There is one sure thing in this year's election. There is not enough people to vote. The voting rate in 2012 was 55%, lower than the presidential election four years ago. In the midterm election in 2014, only 36% of Americans voted. This is the worst result for the first time in over 70 years.

As a result of this anemia, the idea that it is being practiced in about 30 other countries has been reproduced. It is to vote as a citizen's request. President Obama said last year "If everyone votes, it will be transformative."

But even proponents of the forced voting do not believe this will happen in the US. The idea of ​​forcing people to vote seems to be anti-democratic. More importantly, this is a partisan problem. As Obama himself suggests, people who tend not to vote often look like Democrats - poor, young, and minorities. According to a recent survey on the exercise of voting rights in Switzerland, the progress status has improved by 20 percentage points as a result of a mandatory vote.

However, in most academic studies, we found that essential voting does not work with ordinary voters, Professor Jason Brennan of Georgetown University, and vote required. "Democrats generally believe that more states will be offered to the Democratic Party through forced voting," he said. "It turned out that this was not a fact, voters and non-voters are about the same regarding party preferences."

This does not mean that the population of the actual elector is completely reflecting the whole country. Mr. Brennan said the biggest difference between voters and non-electoralists is information, not partisan ideology. "People who are not voting do not know about the situation than the people who are currently voting."

Even this alone, even among members of the same party will lead to inconsistent opinions. Martin Gyllens, a political scientist at Princeton University, said the Democratic Party of so-called "less informational members" are opinions on gay rights, military power and free trade, but the Democratic Party is paying close attention to policy debate Stated.

Therefore, even if the outcome of a party does not change significantly under the stipulated voting system, the political system itself will change. Supporters of forced voting say that this will force politicians to solve a wider problem than to rely on a narrow foundation. "In the ideal world, democracy can decide to express the will of all citizens taking into consideration the interests and views of the whole people," the latest in the Brookings Institute's promotion of forced voting The thesis draws a conclusion. "If some people vote frequently and others do not vote, the elected officials may focus on the interests and opinions of non-participants."

However, Georgetown Brennan is suspicious and will appeal to the public. "Forced voting may reduce the quality of the government," he said.

The government has used forced voting for a long time to solve the drop in voter turnout rate. Today, about 25 countries around the world are adopting a compulsory vote, of which 14 are in Latin America. But the experts say whether forced voting can increase voter turnout rate, whether political influence, and perhaps more importantly, will lead to a higher quality wise democratic participation I insist on it. The low voter turnout can be explained by what experts call "collective action". In other words, the community gains collectively from high participation in the election, but individual voting does not bring profit. Voting costs costs including losses and working hours and the impact of individual votes on election results is almost zero. Forced voting and penalties for non-election people will fix this imbalance by not setting bans, costs, and the number of votes. Evidence that it is effective

Many countries are forced to vote. IDEA is an international organization promoting democracy and lists 38 countries that have voted or were forced to vote. They include the United States of America: Georgia ordered a vote in the Constitution of 1777, and if someone provides "reasonable grounds" a fine will be imposed (see Article 12). In many countries, voting is theoretically mandatory, but rarely or not forced. For example, in most parts of Latin America, voting is mandatory. However, in Mexico where waiver of rights is illegal, last year's voter turnout was only 63%.