duty to vote
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No Solution
The reasons people don’t vote suggest a mandatory voting law would be futile Statistics Canada has released the results of a survey, conducted in conjunction with the November 2015 Labour Force Survey, to inquire into Canadians’ “Reasons for not voting in the federal election, October 19, 2015.” These results are interesting, albeit not quite accurate. To my mind Continue reading
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A Civic Choice
This is the last substantive post in my duty-to-vote series. I have already addressed a number of instrumental arguments in favour of such a duty: claims that it allows better aggregation of information about the voters’ preferences, that it enhances the legitimacy of our political system, and that it improves the quality of election campaigns. Continue reading
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It Won’t Help
This is yet another post on the duty to vote. Here, I address arguments according to we have such a duty because if everyone votes, the quality of election campaigns and, possibly, of governance, will be better than under the current state of affairs, where some people vote, and others do not. This argument, like Continue reading
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Is It Legit?
I am continuing my series of posts about the duty to vote ― or nonexistence thereof. Earlier this week, I addressed what I called information-based arguments: claims to the effect that we must vote in order to contribute our views, either about what political option is best for us, or about which of them will Continue reading
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Vote Did You Say?
I am finally beginning my promised series of posts arguing that we do not have a moral duty to vote. In this post, I address arguments in favour of such a duty based on the idea that elections are an information-gathering mechanism. When the information collected through elections is incomplete because some people did not Continue reading
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Must We Vote?
There’s exactly one month to go until election day. It’s as good a moment as any to announce a series of blog posts that I will publish over the next few weeks, to argue that, contrary to what is often said, there is no moral duty to vote or, in other words, that it is Continue reading
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Debts of Gratitude
Over at the CBA National Magazine, Rebecca Bromwich has an interesting article reminding us of our debt of gratitude to the campaigners for women’s suffrage, and arguing that we owe it to their memory to vote it in the upcoming election. The first point is important and well-taken. The second, in my view, does not follow. Continue reading
Double Aspect 