Time to Bring in Compulsory Voting

Yesterday's Ontario election saw the lowest turnout in the provinces history. I had originally estimated 60% based on unofficial results, however, the actual turnout was closer to 50%. I would call this election illegitimate based on that factor alone, since that was not a majority. I think Canadians, all Canadians, should be ashamed by these numbers. It seems to be a growing trend. Federal numbers aren't too bad but turnouts at the provincial, and especially the municipal level are unacceptably low. I believe it is time to bring in mandatory voting.

Mandatory voting is one of many electoral reforms that has been proposed for Canada in recent years. Some countries of note that use this system are Australia, Argentina, Mexico, Chile, Peru, Ecuador, Uruguay, Greece, and Switzerland. In these countries, the punishment for not voting is usually a nominal fine. The system itself is highly controversial for a number of reasons. However, I believe the controversy to be unwarranted. Lets take a look at the reasons why people aren't voting, then the pros and cons of the system. I will be arguing in favour of it.

I believe one of the primary reasons for not voting to be simply laziness. People simply can't be bothered to do their civic duty, since they're so self absorbed in their own lives. This is the truth, however, it doesn't tell the whole story, particularly with turnout skewed towards the federal level. The irony about that is that in such a highly regionalized country as Canada is, more people tend to vote at the national level then the local one. Logically, it would be the other way around. Some political scientists have attempted to explain low turnout by saying that it's due to satisfaction with the status quo. I don't buy this, as logically, people would be mobilized to maintain it, rather than leaving the decision up to others who could possibly change things. The problem with many political scientists is they don't actually go out and talk to your average citizen. I do, and from what I've heard, people are highly dissatisfied with the status quo, but, they do not like any of the alternatives. Now, I'm no expert in the field as some of your supposed pundits and PhDs are, but this tells me something they seem to have trouble grasping. That is that leadership choices political parties are making are weak. Also, political parties are failing to gain the confidence of the people no matter who runs. Most people are unaware that they can spoil their ballot and that spoiled ballots are counted, even if it is off the record. The spoiled ballot count can be used to gauge the level of dissatisfaction.

So what if we were to impose compulsory voting. Everyone 18 and over who is a Canadian citizen would be automatically added to a the voters list. They can either vote or pay a fine if they do not. Some would argue that this is counter democratic since it's the government essentially forcing people to vote. Others say that having the uninformed vote is a dangerous prospect. I don't agree with those statements. First of all, people not voting is far more dangerous than forcing people to vote because it leaves decisions that effect everyone to increasingly smaller majorities of people. A parliament that was elected by only 50% of people does not fairly reflect society and it's current needs and values. Therefore, it is actually less democratic not forcing people to vote. The current system is ok if people are being mobilized on their own.
As for the issue of uninformed voters, I believe this to be a double failure by both the education system and the media. First of all, Ontario high schools do not dedicate enough class time to political science, aka civics. When I was going through high school, they had just brought ina mandatory civics course. However, it was only a two month half course. At university level, a basic political science course is usually two semesters long. I guess they would rather focus on more important subjects like PhysEd and Art rather than teaching kids the basics of the democratic system they live under. Ideally, I would like to see civics and law be made mandatory course in the Ontario curriculum. Civics should be a full semester. Also, there needs to be more political science offerings at the high school level at the higher grades to allow kids to further pursue the topic. Getting people interested in politics at a young age would go a long way to stamping out the apathetic and uninformed citizenry that has been plaguing the democratic process in Canada.
The media too needs to do a better job. Rather than just hiring these talking heads who drone on, they need to engage people more. Make it more interactive, and not just through online polls. The media devotes maybe only five minutes to politics on most evening news casts, yet 15min to sports. Lack of media involvement was directly responsible for much of the confusion regarding the mixed member referendum in Ontario. Once again, the media needs to be getting younger people interested. I praise efforts like Diddy's (aka Sean Colmbs) "Vote or Die", who try to mobilize young people to the polls but they still don't get them talking about the issues. That needs to change. I believe the media does have a responsibility to the public to perform such duties.

So with these failures and citizens' apathy, we need to bring in compulsory voting. We need to get people mobilized. The way I would do it is implement the Australian method. Australia is a good model to use since out of all commonwealth countries, it is the most similar to Canada both politically and historically. It's simple. If you don't vote, you have to pay a nominal fine. While fines usually don't work it will get a few more people out in the polls, since most people hate paying fines in any amount. A side benefit to the fines is that they could be used to pay for operating the election itself. A second reform would be to add a "None of the Above" choice to the ballot. Some US states use this. If None of the Above gets a majority of votes, a new election is automatically called. The problem with spoiled ballots is there is no way to tell if the person did it deliberately or accidentally. A "None of the Above" choice would count voter dissatisfaction officially. Thirdly, I think we need to make election campaigns longer. Though most people get sick of hearing it, I think one month is not long enough to properly discuss the issues. With most of Canada moving towards fixed election dates, extending campaign length is no longer the issue it once was. In the US for example, presidential campaigns start more than a year prior to the election. I'm not saying we should take it to that extreme, but 2-4 months is more appropriate. It gives citizens more time to think over choices and ask more questions and it allows politicians to reach more people in person. If we implement these choices, I believe they will go a long way to reversing declining voter turnouts.