Do you have a duty to vote?

Hi. I’m Geoff Pynn. I teach philosophy at Elgin Community College. In this video, I’m going to talk about whether, in a democracy, citizens have not just the right to vote, but a duty to vote. Around election season, we receive many reminders of the importance of voting. Leaders from all walks of life remind us to vote. Voters wear stickers declaring “I voted!” as a sign of civic pride. Political activists, schoolteachers, business leaders, clergy and celebrities, however much they disagree, all seem united in their view that you should vote. Some democracies legally require voting. But such laws are usually thought to reflect a pre-existing civic duty. Where does that duty come from? A common estimate of the chance of an American voter casting the determining vote in a Presidential election is around one in 100 million. That’s similar to the odds of winning the jackpot in a large lottery. But playing the lottery isn’t a rational money-making scheme. Given that you’re as unlikely to sway the outcome of an election as you are to win the jackpot, why is voting even worth your time, let alone something you ought to do? Well, for one thing, the reason it’s irrational to buy a lottery ticket isn’t just the bad odds -- it’s also that the payout isn’t big enough. “Expected value” is a concept used to make rational decisions under conditions of uncertainty. If an action’s expected value is positive, it’s reasonable to perform that action, even if the odds things will go your way are small. If a lottery ticket has a one in 100 million chance of winning, and the jackpot is $50 million, the expected value of a $1 ticket is negative 50 cents — a waste of money. But if the jackpot is $300 million, the same ticket’s expected value is positive $2. Now consider a high stakes presidential election. Suppose that it costs $25 of your time and energy to vote, but that the net benefit to the country, if your candidate wins, would be $10 billion. Then the expected value of your vote would be $75. Of course, the expected value to you personally is still very small. But when you’re voting, you’re not just looking to benefit yourself. You’re trying to benefit everybody. One problem with this argument is that it implies that it’s irrational to vote when your side’s victory wouldn’t make a large enough difference. The duty to vote is not usually thought to depend upon the choices you’re given. Another problem is that there seem to be many other uses of your resources that would benefit society even more than voting. For example, you could volunteer at a soup kitchen. Why should you vote, instead of doing something else that benefits society in a different way? Well, imagine if everybody followed the same line of reasoning, and decided that they could skip voting with a clear conscience. Wouldn’t the whole system collapse? “What if everybody did that?” arguments are tricky. The fact that something bad would follow if everybody did something doesn’t mean nobody should do it. If everybody tried to visit the Grand Canyon next weekend, disaster would ensue — imagine the crowds! But that’s no reason to cancel your trip to the Grand Canyon. After all, you know that’s not going to happen. The fact is, the system won’t collapse if you don’t vote. Things will almost certainly go on as usual. So why should you? Well by not voting, you’d be relying on the people who do vote to keep the system running. In other words, you’d be a freeloader. You’d be like a team member who sleeps in, skips practice, and slacks off, but still basks in the glory when their team wins. Your duty to vote would be like your duty to do your part in keeping democracy afloat. Another rationale has to do with complicity in injustice. If you’re part of a group that you know is doing something wrong, you’re complicit in that wrongdoing. Even if you can’t do anything to prevent the wrong, it’s still better not to be complicit. Separating from a group doing wrong is a way of showing respect: respect for the victims of the group’s wrong doing, respect for the moral principles you believe in, and respect for yourself as a person who endorses those principles. As a citizen of a democracy, you’re part of the group that collectively decides what your government is going to do. If you know your government is doing something unjust, but you don’t vote against the injustice, aren’t you complicit? And isn’t this true even if your vote almost certainly wouldn’t make a difference? Perhaps your duty to vote comes not just from your obligation not to be a freeloader, but from your duty not to be complicit in injustice. What do you think?