In a recent paper excerpted by Bryan Caplan, Brown philosopher Jason Brennan argues that the answer to this question is yes, and even suggests that poorly informed citizens have a moral obligation not to exercise the franchise:
Irresponsible individual voters ought to abstain rather than vote badly. This thesis may seem anti-democratic. Yet it is really a claim about voter responsibility and how voters can fail to meet this responsibility. On my view, voters are not obligated to vote, but if they do vote, they owe it to others and themselves to be adequately rational, unbiased, just, and informed about their political beliefs. Similarly, most of us think we are not obligated to become parents, but if we are to be parents, we ought to be responsible, good parents. We are not obligated to become surgeons, but if we do become surgeons, we ought to be responsible, good surgeons. We are not obligated to drive, but if we do drive, we ought to be responsible drivers. The same goes for voting.
Concluding that voters have a moral duty to be informed about politics doesn't require one to also believe that government should deny the franchise to the poorly informed. One can believe that all adult citizens should have a right to vote, while also holding that they have a duty to either become adequately informed or refrain from using that right. The latter obligation may not be enforceable by the government; but that doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. We have many moral duties that cannot or should not be enforced by law. Consider, for example, our moral obligations to our friends. If I betray a friend's trust, the government does not and should not punish me for it. But that doesn't mean that it's a morally acceptable thing to do.
If ignorant voters were choosing leaders and policies only for themselves, there might be no ethical problem with their being ill-informed. They would bear the full cost of their ignorance. Unfortunately, as John Stuart Mill pointed out, to vote is to wield "power over others." The politicians elected by ignorant voters will rule over all of us, knowledgeable and ignorant alike. The ethical voter therefore has a responsibility to his fellow citizens as well as to himself.
Unfortunately, the evidence suggests that the vast majority of citizens are both poorly informed about politics and often highly biased in their evaluation of the information they do know. If citizens do indeed have a duty to either become informed about politics or refrain from casting a ballot, most of them aren't living up to it. I have argued that this is perfectly rational and not a sign of voters' "stupidity." But rational conduct isn't always morally defensible conduct.
I'm not yet completely convinced that citizens have a moral duty to become informed about politics or not vote. Even if they do, it might be overriden by other moral imperatives in some cases (e.g. - if you can't become informed about this year's election because your time is taken up by other pressing moral duties, such as the need to care for a sick relative who requires round-the-clock attention). It's also difficult to determine exactly how much knowledge should be considered sufficient to meet the average voter's moral obligations to fellow citizens. However, I am sympathetic to the general outline of Brennan's argument as I understand it so far. I look forward to reading his paper in detail once I get my hands on the full version.
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We have a duty to vote for what is best for the country, and it should be noted that the Republican slogan "Country First" seems to express that idea.
1) can't it be argued that there are effective information shortcuts, such as candidates' party affiliation, that enables uninformed voters to make reasonable choices, where reasonable is defined as choosing a candidate whose views most closely mirror the voter's own policy preferences?
2) Does the information that high-information voters possess ultimately make much, if any, difference in their choices? Or are even these voters' minds mostly made up by other factors - height, race, personal appeal, blind allegiance to party, etc.
Part of being an informed voter is to know whether the candidate was screened, and how.
In my experience, educated people are interested in candidates as proxies for their pet policies. They are not that interested in whether their party's guy is or isn't a phony; they're interested in getting their judges elected, adjusting taxes in the right way, or whatever. But, on one view, "sizing up" a potential president (or other official) is more important than making sure you're up on their stance on tariffs. Ironically, it's a "moral" judgment sneered at by those who feel morally entitled to govern the uneducated masses.
If it is immoral to be an ignorant voter, it seems to me to be the moral equivalent of overtime parking or spitting in the ocean.
(Slightly off-topic: it seems to me that the main effect of this is that organizations which have a natural ability to Get Out The Vote are much less important in Aus politics than in U.S. politics.)
Anecdotal evidence suggests that more Australians pay some attention to politics than do Americans, and there is hard evidence (going back decades) that more Australians follow and understand basic economics than in other nations. So I wonder if compulsory voting leads to increased "political literacy". IMO, it does make for a healthier political climate (because the parties and the journalists have to reach out to mass audiences, not just those of us who enjoy politics).
Obviously, Libertarians have objections with compulsory voting. Being only somewhat Libertarian, I say the pragmatic benefits outweigh those objections.
It is the two-party system that makes lazy uninformed voters, because voters choose a candidate's 'brand' rather than his or her actual qualities. People would be forced to find out what a person is actually about if the candidate didn't have a logo on the forehead.
Indeed.
Using that metric, we should explictly reject John McCain, as he's proposing even larger tax cuts in aggregate than Obama, despite us being involved in two wars and the ballooning national debt.
Your argument for electing Obama is quite persuasive.
I may be making unwarranted assumptions when you unpack this argument made by a Brown University philosopher what you'll find is "The unwashed masses need to be made to understand that the progressive platform is better for them and if you don't get it just SHUT UP and STAY HOME!"
And Darrin even if you don't think we're on the right side of the Laffer curve, even if you don't think that dropping corporate taxes (higher here than most "socialist" countries, and even if you're not a fan of "starving the beast", it's hard to believe that you can't think of any other option to balance the budget than to raise taxes. Hint -- the money goes in, the money goes out.
Modern education largely fails to educate on the founding principles of our country and the workings of government and economic systems. Democrats would fight, have fought, the imposition of any qualifications for voters - not because Dem voters are so well educated (as a group they are NOT), but because so many would fail to pass even the most basic of tests. The Democratic Party in its present form could not exist in a country populated by objective, informed citizens who actually understood the issues and voted "best for the country".
Or it could stretch out to contain history and current events only peripherally connected with politicians.
Problem is, most folks have some familiarity with at least one issue in the latter category. So, notwithstanding their not understanding of how the government gives F&F an economic advantage, some of them know farming. Some know war. Some know roads and sewers. Some know insurance. Some know transportation. Some know energy production. Some know social work and the actual issues of poverty.
The "informed" model is that of a professor or other superior being using his spare time to become informed. Sort of an avocation. For some reason, it does not include really knowing things by virtue of working at them for a living.
Funny, that.
And, of course, this avocation model means that the professor or other superior being knows less about anything than the people--usually quite a number--who actually work in the field in question.
The connection between the professor or other superior being and the people who actually do stuff is so evanescent that the professor or other superior being has no clue how little clue he has.
Funny, that.
The main point at issue appears to be more the moral obligation to be knowledgeable about voting, not whether government should require voters to be informed.
Perhapbs. But basing one's vote on whether a candidate will shrink government or limit its growth requires quite a broad range of knowledge: how will a given candidate try to shrink government? can he feasibly do so given his party and his political know-how? will he shrink it in some ways but make it grow in others?
Only Ron Paul can save us with the truth about 9/11 and the gold standard because if we make more gold it will balance that there budget and buy more oil.
People who cast uninformed votes, relying on something they read in a mass email forward or whatever, don't seem to raise any kind of "moral question" (whatever that means), but they do seem to raise a pretty strong argument for authoritarianism. If we are incapable of ruling ourselves through the casting of educated votes, then we can't really complain when our leaders take matters into their own hands and solve our problems all on their own.
So who cares about morals? Voter's interests and preferences are revealed in their preparation to vote. E.g. do you want a guy who says God will tell him what to do; or who drinks the same beer as you; or do you want someone who has X, Y, and Z policies? But maybe voters don't want to come up with solutions--maybe they just want someone they respect to do it for them? It's more-or-less a system of our own design.
No, because the very small chance of affecting the election is balanced by a very large change in circumstance for everyone in the country (and perhaps many others outside). Essentially, voting well is an altruistic act.
So, is the argument, then, that educated voters tend to skew to the left, ergo encouraging voters to be educated is a bad idea?
... wat?
Analysis here
I had the same suspicion that others had here, that "informed" could have a very slippery meaning. My two sons adopted from Romania follow politics very little. Before their first election we had them sit down and read party attitude summaries. They decided that Libertarians were the farthest from the communists, the Republicans second-farthest, and so vote for a libertarian when there is one, and a Republican if there's not. That seems quite sensible to me.
It's easier to argue that politicians have a moral duty to be informed, and it is possible to create some criteria for an informed politician. We may not agree on what our goals ought to be, but whether a particular policy is likely to achieve its stated goals is a largely empirical question. A requirement that legislators be reasonably informed about the real-world consequences of their actions seems reasonable, as does a requirement that they be honest about those consequences throughout the legislative process.
Holding politicians accountable would reduce the amount of misleading rhetoric, which would probably lead to a more informed electorate.
No, not an educated vote. Too passive voice. A knowledgeable vote, yes, I can agree on that, mere information being insufficient.
An example: Parental controls for TV. The vast majority of parents believe they have the information and technology to individually control what they and their kids see on TV. Therefore they should vote against additional controls. However, many voters are convinced that other parents lack the ability to control TV, therefore they vote for controls they think other parents want, but which in actuality few if any parents need or want.
The problem is that while you have a good idea of what you need, you really cannot know what every other individual needs. Unless, of course, you are one of the nanny-state types who think everyone should need exactly what you want. Yes. Now we have to agree on what “educated” means. Which issues, which sides? There’s a pretty good faction in both political parties who believe that anyone who votes against their programs must just be uneducated, since the programs are the One True Way To Run The World.
Recent example on these pages, concerning belief in intelligent design.
My final analysis of the question notes that in almost all U.S. elections the typical voter ends up with a very limited list of viable candidates in the primary, and one R and one D in the election. Therefore party-line voting and single-issue voting provide all the knowledge really required to choose the lesser evil.
That formulation seems to conflate the good man with the good citizen.
On my view, voters are not obligated to vote, but if they do vote, they owe it to others and themselves to be adequately rational, unbiased, just, and informed about their political beliefs.
In other words, only philosophers should vote. But philosophers (qua philosophers) don't want to vote.
Actually, we don't. We would get socialism, runaway inflation, and the breakdown of society. One of the most important insights provided by public choice theory and the work on iterated prisoners' dilemma simulations is that what is rational for each of many players may be irrational for the group as a whole. That is the basis for the concerns of the Founders that civic virtue was critical for the execution of a constitutional order.
Few college-educated persons are taught to appreciate the difficulties of intervening in complex social systems without incurring adverse unintended consequences, or to be suspicious of any simple solution as more likely to be counterproductive. See Counterintuitive Behavior of Social Systems, by Jay Forrester.
I find many "working class", non-college-educated persons often are more informed about candidates and issues, because their education has included the practical problems of making a living and perhaps running a business.
However, I would like voters to be able to pass a test on the basics of government, starting with the Constitution, provided that I composed the test. I have had a hand in doing that for high school textbooks across the country.
Perhaps my reaction was because too often “vote for the good of the country” = “vote for bigger more restrictive more socialistic government.”
No, no. Suppose that the reason educated voters tend to skew to the left has nothing to do with their being educated - there's no causation there - it's just some sort of cultural bias that correlates with receiving higher education. That is, people who opt to get such education are already liberals. Then, if you say that there's a moral duty that less educated voters stay home, and less educated voters actually act on that, it follows that you end up with an electorate that's culturally biased against voting for conservatives. Personally, I'm skeptical that the votes of higher-information voters are actually that informed. You can be the most informed voter in the world, but it will still often be the case that your vote is determined by something having nothing to do with your information - you're prejudiced against people who wear their small-town backgrounds on their sleeve, you have great disdain for evangelicals, you're a racist, your parents raised you to vote Republican, you subconsciously prefer the taller candidate, etc.
1. They are indoctrinated by liberal academics and fellow students. See this for a report on how the American Constitution Society tries to indoctrinate law students.
2. Guilt over having advantages over less gifted or educated persons, and a desire to assuage that guilt by trying to help the disadvantaged, without critically examining whether one's efforts are misguided and perhaps counterproductive.
Much of the liberal bias of academics seems to stem from (2), and they attempt to assuage their guilt by recruiting students to becoming intervenors, but without the experience many libertarians have in transitioning from liberalism of trying to practice noblesse oblige in the real world and experiencing blowback.
"Much of the liberal bias of academics seems to stem from (2), and they attempt to assuage their guilt by recruiting students to becoming intervenors, but without the experience many libertarians have in transitioning from liberalism of trying to practice noblesse oblige in the real world and experiencing blowback."
I would concur and add that this dynamic has evolved into a disturbingly effective means of perpetuating privilege, as the best and brightest of the rising classes are sucked out of their communities and indoctrinated in value systems inimical to their advancement.
Given how often, and how much, politicians change their mind, isn't "how much do I like/trust candidate X" arguably much more "rational" than "how much do I like the stated positions of candidate X (given they may not bother with following through with any of them)?"
Not to mention the argument that isolated cases aside, one's individual vote is unlikely to have any effect on the outcome, how can one say it's any more "rational" to vote any more than it is "rational" to buy a lottery ticket?
I prefer the expanded set of categories in the excerpt linked to, though I still don't fully agree with the premise (and I don't mean merely because of logical proofs that a perfect democratic voting system is impossible because of non-transitive voter preferences or the like, if that's the correct term, i.e. someone may reasonably prefer A to B, prefer B to C, but still prefer C to A).
Rationality is also not an objective standard. If one person thinks abortion (pro-choice or pro-life) is the most important issue, someone else thinks earmarks is, another corporate tax rate, another sending a message about race is, someone else thinks sending a message about gender politics is, I would probably personally disagree with making any "one-issue" decisions, but at least could understand and consider the person's choice "rational" if they place a heavy value on such an issue.
If most voters could keep a reasonably open mind and be reasonably well-informed, I'd be ecstatic. I don't mind people who have limited time or ability to become well-informed and do the best they can. What kills me is people who, regardless of their IQ, are UNWILLING to pay attention to anything that might change their mind.
No, it's that you're confusing cause and effect. If educated people skew Democratic because jobs that require education are associated with unions and big government, then increasing the number of educated people without making their jobs government funded and unionized shouldn't increase the number of Democrats.
That is, for 1000 people at the start of their college education, n% are liberal. At the end of their college education, n has increased. This increase (or possibly decrease) should be measurable. Has anyone done so?
Thanks for the comments and the post. I just noticed this.
Note that the excerpt above doesn't give my argument. It's from an introductory paragraph.
If you'd like to see the paper, you can email me and I'll send it to you. (Bob from Ohio would then be in a position to judge if the argument really is nonsense or not. It is certainly elitist, though I don't know if it's smug.)