I think that this is a great public forum topic: it relates to a current event that will educate students on some of the nuanc
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Lesson 4.2 Day 3
| 13NFL1-Compulsory Voting Page 112 of 163 www.victorybriefs.com IF CITIZENS AREN’T INTERESTED IN VOTING, THEY SHOULDN’T BE FORCED TO BE— COMPULSORY VOTING VIOLATES THE BASIC TENETS OF DEMOCRACY. Armin Schafer 11, Fellow at the Hanse Institute for Advanced Studies in Delmenhorst], Republican liberty and compulsory voting, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies discussion paper, No. 11/17, 2011. Normative arguments against compulsory voting revolve around four themes the value of political participation, the reasons for abstention, the right not to vote, and the justifiability of sanctions. The first and most common argument against legally forcing people to vote is that interest in politics is unevenly distributed across society. Citizens are not primarily political animals but cherish a wide variety of activities. Even if we thought that everyone would benefit from listening to classical music, we would not force anyone to do so. The same should hold true for political participation:Instead, therefore, of preaching the duty to act as apolitical animal to those who have no inclination that way and would do it badly if compelled, it may well be wiser to leave them to cultivate their private gardens, and to rely merely upon the experience of democracies that there is always in fact a wide enough interest in politics and voting to work the political machinery. Mayo 1959: If democracy is, above all, about the selection of competent leaders, then the level of turnout is of secondary importance. And if voting and political participation in general are no more valuable activities than other leisure time pursuits, there is no point in forcing people to become involved in politics (Lomasky/Brennan 2000: 63). Citizens are free to spend time as they deem fit and the state should not interfere with their choices as long as they are not harmful to others. Download 2 Mb. Share with your friends:
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