13NFL1-Compulsory Voting
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EVEN IF PEOPLE HAVE A PRIMA FACIE DUTY TO VOTE, OTHER MORAL DUTIES MAY
TRUMP THIS OBLIGATION, MAKING COMPULSORY VOTING INAPPROPRIATE
Annabelle Lever Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method London School of Economics and Political Science, Compulsory Voting A Criminal Perspective
British Journal of
Political Science
(December, 2008). Some people believe that democratic citizenship entails a prima facie duty to vote I do not share this view, but see no reason why it should be incompatible with the arguments I have presented here. People who think citizens have a prima facie duty to vote may believe that conscientious objections, as well as maltreatment by the state, can release one from this duty. They can also hold that, even where the duty has force, it can be overridden by more pressing concerns. Hence, it would be morally wrong to force people to vote. So, the idea of a prima-facie duty to vote is consistent with my arguments against legal compulsion, and with my claim that it is an open question when, if ever, our duties as citizens actually require us to vote. However, once we accept that moral duties, like moral rights, can conflict, I am not sure what is gained conceptually, or in moral and political judgement, by referring to prima facie rights and duties I therefore prefer to say that people do not generally have a duty to vote simply because they are citizens, rather than to say that citizens have a prima facie duty to vote, whose consequences for voting are, simply, indeterminate.
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