The Ability to Formally Withhold Consent at Elections Leads to Real Democracy and Maximises the Common Good

[TimeSeeker]

Abstention = not voting. Which which can be signaled not voting. And obviously counts as nothing. As it is not a vote.

NOTA = which is withholding your consent for an election to declare a winner, which is signaled by ticking the NOTA box. Which counts a vote. As it is a vote.

Naturally you don't want any overlap between the 2 as this will distort the outcome of an election from being the will of the majority.

We are not arguing over the definitions/distinctions between abstention and voting now.

I am trying to understand your conception/criterion for "real democracy": Do you live in a "real democracy" if 49% of the voter base can dictate policy for 51% of the abstainers? That is not "the will of the majority". It is the "will of those who cared enough to vote".

Is "real democracy" founded on the OPPORTUNITY or the RESPONSIBILITY to vote?

Yes it is.

Yes it is.... which one?

As abstaining when a NOTA option is present is a choice, and the choice is to go along with voters choose, as otherwise they would have voted.

Begging the question. Abstaining to vote is a form of protest against the system.

Surely if 80% of people refuse to vote that means something!

It means "I don't want to waste my time sitting in a queue ticking a box to TELL you that I am not interested".

[romanv]

Voting does not automatically involve logic and reason no more than not voting does not involve them
Abstaining is an important part of the democratic process and is why voting should not be compulsory

See! You and romanv already have different conceptions of what a "democracy" is supposed to be and how it's supposed to work! Whose conception is "better"?

I guess we could put it to a vote

I have never once advocated for voting to be compulsory. if fact I support his view.

[TimeSeeker]

I have never once advocated for voting to be compulsory. if fact I support his view.

Then you necessarily contradict your definition of democracy where your rights cannot be taken away from you.

If 51% abstain from voting then 49% can take away your rights. In fact the numbers don't matter.

Those who vote can take away the rights of those who don't.

[romanv]

We are not arguing over the definitions/distinctions between abstention and voting now.

I am trying to understand your conception/criterion for "real democracy": Do you live in a "real democracy" if 49% of the voter base can dictate policy for 51% of the abstainers? That is not "the will of the majority". It is the "will of those who cared enough to vote".

Is "real democracy" founded on the OPPORTUNITY or the RESPONSIBILITY to vote?

Yes it is.

Yes it is.... which one?

As abstaining when a NOTA option is present is a choice, and the choice is to go along with voters choose, as otherwise they would have voted.

Begging the question. Abstaining to vote is a form of protest against the system.

Surely if 80% of people refuse to vote that means something!

It means "I don't want to waste my time sitting in a queue ticking a box to TELL you that I am not interested".

No-one would know what it meant until a NOTA vote was present. Then if it was present and 80% still chose to abstain, then it means nothing except that they abstain.

NOTA is not saying you are not interested. NOTA is saying you are interested, but cannot get what you want.

[romanv]

I have never once advocated for voting to be compulsory. if fact I support his view.

Then you necessarily contradict your definition of democracy where your rights cannot be taken away from you.

If 51% abstain from voting then 49% can take away your rights. In fact the numbers don't matter.

Those who vote can take away the rights of those who don't.

No they can't. If they could then it isn't a democracy

[romanv]

I am so tired of timewaster. He just wants to troll and derail this thread with nonsense.

I will no longer respond to him.

[TimeSeeker]

No-one would know what it meant until a NOTA vote was present. Then if it was present and 80% still chose to abstain, then it means nothing except that they abstain.

Then we might as well put a tickbox that says "ABSTAIN" as well as one that says "NOTA".

Otherwise - how would you tell apart "I don't want to vote" from "Life happened and I couldn't make it"

NOTA is not saying you are not interested. NOTA is saying you are interested, but cannot get what you want.

So you put the burden on the electorate to tell you that that the options suck?

It's like a restaurant owner expecting non-customers to come tell them that their menu is poor.
If nobody comes to your restaurant - your food sucks!

[TimeSeeker]

I am so tired of timewaster. He just wants to troll and derail this thread with nonsense.

I will no longer respond to him.

Same old story. Everybody hates it when their idealism fails on rigorous scrutiny. As if reality is going to be any kinder to your idea

It's rather ironic that you don't want YOUR time wasted, but you are perfectly happy to design a system which wastes the time of an ENTIRE FUCKING NATION who must come and TELL the powers that be that the menu sucks.

Don't waste our time! If I we couldn't be bothered to come and vote - it's BECAUSE NOTA! It's BECAUSE I don't think any significant change can come from voting!

But there is a bigger problem on your hands: when voter turnout drops below 50% democracy blows up!
And guess what? Global voter turnout is on a downward trend and it is even worse in ex-Communist countries!!!!!! https://www.idea.int/sites/default/file ... -world.pdf

That should scare the crap out of you!

People are disillusioned with and apathetic to democracy. Voting is a waste of time - make it worth my while to show up! Putting the burden on the already-disillusioned to come and tick the "NOTA" box only makes the problem worse.

The distinction between fail-open and fail-closed in systems design is foreign to you and so you probably have no good argument on how we ought to decide whether democracy should fail-close or fail-open as more and more people boycott the system.

I want no-vote to mean NOTA BECAUSE within our life time voter turnout will drop below 50%. And then - bad things will happen!

[surreptitious57]

You and romanv already have different conceptions of what a democracy is supposed to be and how it is supposed to work !

What makes a democracy more than voting is how responsible are those who are voted into power
Because it is far more important than the simple act of putting an X in a box once every five years
So then whether voting is made compulsory or not is irrelevant to this more fundamental principle

[TimeSeeker]

What makes a democracy more than voting is how responsible are those who are voted into power
Because it is far more important than the simple act of putting an X in a box once every five years
So then whether voting is made compulsory or not is irrelevant to this more fundamental principle

Different aspects - but it all boils down to risk management. What you are referring to is representative accountability.

Voting has multiple functions. One function is representative selection. Another function is accountability.

Currently - the only way to hold an elected representative accountable is to elect somebody else in their place. That is, unless they refuse to step down despite losing an election

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/mar/31/zimbabwe1

Every conception of "democracy" I have ever encountered is idealism at its best. Because every idealist only focuses on the best-case and completely ignore the worst-case.

System failure. And democracy has MANY failure modes. Voter apathy being one of them.

[surreptitious57]

Every conception of democracy I have ever encountered is idealism at its best . Because none
of those idealists have any answers as to how to deal with system failure . And democracy fails a lot !

Idealism is great in principle until it meets reality whereupon it fails and sometimes spectacularly so
Democracy may fail a lot but it is the least worst of all available options which is why it has survived
Expecting it to be perfect is just being idealistic as no human system can be perfect but can over time be improved upon

[TimeSeeker]

Every conception of democracy I have ever encountered is idealism at its best . Because none
of those idealists have any answers as to how to deal with system failure . And democracy fails a lot !

Idealism is great in principle until it meets reality whereupon it fails and sometimes spectacularly so
Democracy may fail a lot but it is the least worst of all available options which is why it has survived
Expecting it to be perfect is just being idealistic as no human system can be perfect but can over time be improved upon

Right. So when one proposes NOTA - what problem/system failure risk in democracy is one trying to fix? Is it a serious problem?

Well. Lets look at it in context.

Do we focus on the 3-5% of people who presently spoil the ballot and give them a tickbox (what does that achieve?), or do we focus on the 35% (and growing!) of people who no longer care to show up for voting?

[surreptitious57]

So when one proposes NOTA - what problem / risk in democracy are you trying to fix ?
The 5 % of people who spoil the ballot or the 25 % of people who no longer show up to vote ?

I dont advocate compulsory voting because it does not necessarily address the issue of voter apathy
Being made to do something that should be a matter of conscience is not very democratic any way
So using non democratic means to make democracy appear more effective is not a good idea at all

[TimeSeeker]

So when one proposes NOTA - what problem / risk in democracy are you trying to fix ?
The 5 % of people who spoil the ballot or the 25 % of people who no longer show up to vote ?

I dont advocate compulsory voting because it does not necessarily address the issue of voter apathy
Being made to do something that should be a matter of conscience is not very democratic anyway
So using non democratic means to make democracy appear more effective is not a good idea at all

It doesn't prevent voter apathy. What it prevents is system failure as a result of voter apathy.
I imagine we want system which don't blow up in our face and kill us when we are being stupid?

Isn't this why we build such systems in the first place? To ensure our collective safety.

[romanv]

For those new to the thread.

The first post described what I refer to as 'real democracy' which is the adherence popular sovereignty. ie all power is vested in the people. If this is the case then the people must be free, as that is the only way they can have power. If they are free then they must have inalienable rights that guarantee that freedom.

So democracy rests upon and is sustained by our inalienable rights. So there are inherent limits to power 'real democracy' confers to the state through the electoral system, the state can't strip anyone of the freedom that give them power, conceptually that is clearly impossible.

One poster constantly straw-manning by demanding the mechanism by which those rights are guaranteed.

I responded that the judicial system is in place, and there is often a constitution that demarcates the limits of the state, and the concept of 'real democracy' can only bolster the notion our freedom is a necessary precondition to democracy, and serve as further arguments to present to the courts.

However I have to somehow come up with a guarantee that rights will not be stripped, which is nuts.

How this has anything to with the inclusion of NOTA on the ballot is something you have to ask him.

Addition: BTW the notion of popular sovereignty is not my definition of democracy, but one that has been endorsed by most of this planet (perhaps not timewasters planet) through the Universal declaration of Human rights and the International Covenant of Civil and Political rights, both of which underpin international law and provide a framework for reference for law courts throughout the world.

The addition of NOTA on the ballot ensures that electoral systems guarantee the adherence to popular sovereignty by ensuring that state reflects the will of the majority, unlike now, where states are hijacked by cliques who control political parties and their big money backers who have influence well beyond their numbers that prevents the manifestation of the will of the people. This prevents the maximisation of the common good, which would be logically inevitable in a 'real democracy'.