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 86 of 163 www.victorybriefs.com POLITICAL INTEGRATION COMPULSORY VOTING PROMOTES POLITICAL INTEGRATION. Anthoula Malkopoulou postdoctoral researcher at the Finnish Academy Project, "Lost Voters Participation in EU elections and the case for compulsory voting, Centre for European Policy Studies Working Document No. July 2009. The main rationale behind the system in Belgium was to complement and enforce universal suffrage, which was introduced in the same constitutional reform of 1893. Compulsory voting was away to fulfil the principle of political integration, in other words it was a method to politically unite a socially disparate people. In this sense, if the principle of universality is a central aspect of voting rights, its progressive realisation requires respect from the state and protection from third- party interference. As with all human rights, the third and most advanced step is fulfilling such rights, in other words providing guarantees that they will be exercised.So, full political integration is perhaps the strongest argument for compulsory voting. Indeed, the most important implication of universal participation is political equality. In his milestone article in 1997, Arend Lijphart argued that low turnout is biased against citizens with a lower education, income and social class. According to him, citizens with lower education or modest social status, as well as those belonging to ethnic, linguistic or religious minorities, are more prone to abstention than others. Conversely, voluntary voting perpetuates political inequalities and misrepresentation. Paradoxically, the claim of abstainers that the European Parliament is an elitist establishment is reinforced by abstention itself. |