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 92 of 163 www.victorybriefs.com ARGUMENTS ABOUT UNINFORMED VOTERS ARE IMPLAUSIBLE. HLR – 2007. The Case for Compulsory Voting in the United States Harvard Law Review, Vol. 121, No. 2 (Dec, 2007), pp. 591-612. The assumption that nonvoters are politically ignorant is also questionable. First, it is perfectly understandable for even the most politically informed citizens to refrain from voting due to the negligible probability that their vote will influence the outcome and to the nonnegligible private costs they incur by voting. n Second, as an empirical matter, the assumption that most nonvoters are politically ignorant is inaccurate. For example, a study of the 1990 election for the US. Senate found that only 18% of nonvoters fit the stereotype of individuals who are "oblivious to the campaign and ... better off staying away from the polls" n Even if current nonvoters are less informed than current voters, their votes might still improve electoral outcomes. This is simply an application of the Condorcet Jury Theorem n (CJT). Assuming that there is a "correct" outcome to an election, n then as long as the population of nonvoters will choose that correct outcome with an average probability greater than 50%, n their participation in the election will improve the expected outcome. The limited information each individual voter possesses is more than balanced by the sheer quantity of voters. This is one reason why democratic government is better than government by some benevolent group of philosopher kings. It also supports the notion that high voter turnout is a good thing, because a large electorate will do better than a small one. The concern with underinformed voters also assumes that current nonvoters' levels of political engagement and awareness are static. As noted in Part II, one of the potential benefits of compulsory voting is [*609] that it can make government more relevant to the lives of current nonvoters and can thus increase their levels of political engagement. n111 Compulsory voting can also force political candidates to change the way that they communicate their messages and reach out to the electorate. Thus, overtime, compulsory voting may cause current nonvoters to become more politically informed. |