People should actively want to vote

The argument

This argument challenges the assumption that a larger electorate is necessarily a better one. Proponents of mandatory voting expect compulsion to produce positive gains — a more representative result, a more engaged public. The objection is that those gains depend on who is being compelled, and that the people who currently abstain are not a random sample of the electorate but specifically those who are apathetic, uninformed, or disillusioned with politics. Forcing that group to vote does not supply them with the interest or the information they lack; it merely records a preference they did not have. The further claim is that abstention is often a considered position rather than a failure. In many cases this sizeable group has elected not to participate for good reasons, having judged that no available option represents them or that their participation would endorse a process they do not accept. Treating that judgement as a defect to be corrected misreads what the non-vote expresses. The predicted consequence is what gives the argument its force. A ballot cast under compulsion by someone with no settled view has to be decided on something, and the likeliest something is whatever is most visible or most dissatisfied. Compelling these voters to participate could therefore lead to more votes and electoral gains for protest and populist parties — parties whose appeal rests on registering discontent rather than on a programme the voter has examined. Compulsion would thus distort the result it was meant to improve. The country is better off, on this reasoning, if those who are disinclined to vote are not forced into public affairs. People should actively want to vote, and because that willingness cannot be manufactured, voting should not be mandatory.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Citizens of democracies are already forced to do things that they may not want to do but are in the public good. This includes allowing their children to be educated, paying tax, and serving on juries. All of these serve a greater societal good and reflect a broader social contract between the governors of society and the governed, which is a careful balance between a citizen’s rights and responsibilities. Voting is the responsibility of each citizen and making it compulsory would ensure that people see it as part of a broader social contract where full participation benefits society as a whole.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P2] Just as the state makes people who may not want to serve on juries, they should be made to vote for the greater public good.