Ideas@TheCentre
Reconsidering compulsory voting
The NSW election made me reconsider my opposition to compulsory voting.
The case against compulsion is that people with little interest in public affairs are driven into polling booths. A good citizen – according to the classic liberal conception – should not need to be forced to fulfil his or her fundamental civic duty.
The fear is that the votes of the informed and public-spirited will be discounted by the votes of the apathetic and ignorant, who only turn out to avoid the fine. The collective wisdom of the polity is reduced.
In addition, people cannot choose to stay away in disgust with the low standards of politics. If ever there was an election when voters wished to register their contempt for the political class by not turning out, last Saturday’s was it.
The counter view is that most compelled voters take their civic duty to decide who governs seriously. Most cast their ballot for one of the major parties because they know something about their programs. They do not spoil their ballot or vote for a minor party, such as the Australian Greens.
Commentators have noted the underperformance of the Greens at the NSW election. No matter the circumstances, the Green vote does not seem capable of rising much higher than 10% of first preferences.
I think compulsory voting plays a role in keeping the Greens politically marginalised, relatively speaking.
The NSW Labor Party shed an unprecedented number of votes. But most of these votes went straight to the Coalition and only a small percent to the Greens. This happened even in the key inner-city seats that the Greens were tipped to win: ‘Trotsky-ville’ (Balmain) and ‘The People’s Republic of Marrickville.’
The Greens’ agenda is radical and its constituency is the tertiary ‘educated,’ latte-left who are engaged with politics and ideologically motivated. Nothing short of a disaster of biblical proportions would keep Greens supporters away from the polls. A low turnout in NSW would have been in the interest of the Greens, as it would have increased the value of its rusted on (composted?) 10% of the vote.
But if there had been no compulsion to vote, and had Labor voters either stayed away in disgust or not taken the duty to decide between the major parties seriously and drifted to the Greens, then the election might have turned out differently.
The Greens might have won the seats they didn’t, and the election might have shifted the political culture in the state and the nation to the Left.
Instead, the compelled voters of NSW, in their collective wisdom, helped keep the Greens on the political fringe – where they belong.
This suggests that compulsory voting helps put the ‘main’ in mainstream politics. Therefore, despite what I think about compulsory voting in theory, in practice the outcomes are not malign.
Dr Jeremy Sammut is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies.
