Secret voting should be mandatory, book argues

In a new book, two scholars argue that making voting more convenient does not combat low voter turnout but instead jeopardizes the integrity of the ballot.

According to recent studies, confidence in elections has declined twice as fast as confidence in democracy, which has also plummeted around the world. Political scientists are concerned about ever-diminishing voter turnout and unequal voter participation.

The future of democracy, it seems, is dire.

In response to low turnout at the polls, several countries have introduced a plethora of policies aimed at making the voting process more convenient—such as postal voting, on-demand absentee balloting, early voting in person, and internet voting. In the United States, about one quarter of all voters opted to cast their votes by mail in the 2016 presidential election.

But there are two problems with these convenience measures.

First, “there is little evidence that such initiatives expand participation in inclusive ways,” say James Johnson, a political science professor at the University of Rochester, and Susan Orr, an associate professor of political science at the College at Brockport, State University of New York. In other words, voting by mail does not make more people vote, nor does it really increase the participation of minorities.

Second, and arguably more importantly, the security of the ballot is not guaranteed if voting takes place at home.

“Such measures threaten electoral integrity,” the political scientists write in their forthcoming book Should Secret Voting Be Mandatory? (Polity, November 2020). The coauthors—a husband-and-wife team—argue that some of these convenience measures undermine the very ballot secrecy that was originally introduced to prevent intimidation and bribery of voters—practices which have started to re-emerge.

Experts agree that increasing voter participation is vital to restoring faith in the democratic processes. That’s why the duo argues that voting in person by secret ballot should be compulsory: “Flatly, we oppose the widespread adoption of policies that make voting more convenient,” they write.

Why? For starters, not everyone who votes at home can do so in complete privacy.

Imagine, for example, that an employer offers to witness your ballot and to mail it for you. Or a landlord sends someone to collect your rent along with your ballot and requests that the envelope remain open. What of immigrants with limited language abilities who encounter a party operative who offers to help in completing the ballot? Or an abusive parent or spouse who insists on the family’s voting together at the kitchen table? The possibilities for abuse and undue influence are myriad if secret voting cannot be ensured, Orr says.

Given the COVID-19 pandemic, voting by mail this November would allow tens of millions of people to participate safely. Yet there are risks to the integrity of the voting. The coauthors are careful to distinguish between outright fraud on one hand—think “stuffing the ballot box” or “losing” ballots—and what they call “electoral domination” on the other. The latter describes efforts by relatively wealthy, powerful, or well-placed people to interfere—more or less directly—with the voting choices of those who are less influential.

“Most of the recent public concern regarding voting by mail in the upcoming election focuses on fraud,” says Johnson, who deems that unease to be “largely misguided.” Yet when it comes to opening the door to electoral domination, the two political scientists are worried.

Such illicit interference can involve bribing or intimidating voters, says Johnson, where the aim is to influence voter choice, but “not to circumvent it.”

That’s why mandatory voting and the secret ballot “are best thought of in tandem,” they write. “In combination they help secure the quality of electoral participation in ways that neither does on its own.”

The authors concede that while legally forcing people to vote infringes on a person’s freedom to stay home on election day, they argue that a secret ballot and mandatory voting would prevent attempts at buying votes or manipulating voter turnout.

Here, they explain why a secret ballot is so important:

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