Should voting be made compulsory ?
The best answer is written by Vivek in the comment section of the debate.We have taken his text/analysis and added our view in this regard.
Compulsory voting means voter are obliged to cast their votes. If eligible voter do not exercise his/her franchise then he/she will be liable to some form of punishment.
Voting process can be looked from two different perspectives. One, as an “expression” and another as a “duty”. If we take former interpretation it can’t be made compulsory while in case of latter it is necessary.
However, voting is neither exactly a duty nor exactly an expression.It is certainly falls little short being being a duty ,or an expression ; in our understanding of these two terms and their application.One can say it is a duty , but it is not obligatory and one can say it is an expression , but expression is essentially manifestation of free will, but in voting free will is limited by choices.
Pro’s :
- To know people’s opinion– Voting is an integral part of democracy, without this process we go back to an oligarchy where only a few number of people decide. The idea of democracy is to avoid this. This also enhances the clarity of the people’s opinions. Moreover if it turns out that for instance 36% had “No Vote”, Political parties may start to wake up and realize that over 1/3 of the population don’t agree with any of them.
- It will enhance the democratic engagement– Compulsory voting is conducive to a higher level of interest in politics among the general population. It is not a perfect system as many times the voters may not fully understand the complexity of the policies, but it does minimise the likelihood of lobby groups and corporations taking control of the government.
- Everyone has a duty to vote for the government of the country where they exercise their rights-It is inconceivable to think that we are governed by political parties who are voted into power by such a small number of voters. It is the responsibility of each individual to make their opinions known regarding who they want in power.
- Elected government will be the representative of larger population rather than section of population which forms electorate.
- Obvious solution for low voter turn-out in election which could not reflect the true will of the people in a democracy.
- Compulsory voting will bring down the cost of elections and reduce the role of black money- Under a regime of compulsory voting, political parties would no longer have to spend a lot of money on “encouraging” voters to come to the polling booth. And given that a large proportion of the funds spent on “encouraging voters” to vote is black money, it is probable that this expenditure might come down in a scenario where the voter has no option but to vote.
- Voting can be made compulsory because it’s our moral and legal responsibility to be part of the nation-building process and stake our claim to having a hand in deciding who should run the country,”
- Intra party democracy– Voting should be made mandatory especially after the inclusion of NOTA option in the Ballot box, where the people can exercise their will of not choosing any of the candidates. So it will bring a great reformation within the political party and will democratize the party internally which the political parties are currently lacking.
- If you don’t vote, you are not becoming the part of democracy. If is it so, then you should also have no right to enjoy the benefits of democracy.
Con’s :
- Voting is an informed choice. Given to the state of education across India, it is highly unlikely the choice will be informed.
- It is an infringement of individual liberty and violated freedom guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution and Violation of Fundamental Right to Expression (Art. 19) which gives us right to not express.
- Mandatory voting violates the freedom of choice– If voting were to be mandatory, the main problem would be that we are no longer in a free and democratic society. This would be one of the first steps on a long slippery slope towards a dictatorship. Even if it is implemented, it will lead to random voting and may lead to political instability. But fewer people know that NOTA is nothing but toothless.NOTA is not considered as a negative vote but rather a NULL vote. Even if NOTA gets more vote in a constituency than any candidate, it will not result in re-elections. Rather candidate who stands at second place (first being NOTA), will be declared winner unless he/she himself persist for re-election.
- Nature of punishment– If voting has to be made compulsory by law, then it goes without saying that such a law will come with its own set of deterrents and punitive action in case of non-compliance. In practical terms, it is very difficult to implement compulsory voting. In the last general elections, nearly 300 million people did not vote. If this is punishable under law, we’ll have to file that many cases, virtually clogging and choking the already overburdened legal system.
So though making voting compulsory is in the bigger interest of democracy but certain preconditions need to be ensured after careful analysis of the cause and nature of low voter turn-out.
The real question is – Does low voter turn-out signify a problem with the voter, or is it a problem with the political system?
- One of the biggest reasons that people choose to stay away from voting is that they believe the vote will not make a difference, and we’ll continue to have corrupt, inefficient and incompetent people in governance.This notion could be avoided by increasing awareness, level of education and perhaps actively involving the people in decision making process. The Election Commission has also set up a voter’s education division, which takes up campaigns using social marketing principles to deal with voter apathy. The strategy has resulted in a significant increase in voters’ participation in the last seven state elections.
- Inadequacy of infrastructure– Given the diversity of the country and the lack of suitable measures for the voting of military personnel, service holders, disables and hospitalized personnel etc. any measure of compulsory voting will be futile.In this digital age and day, that’s unlikely to be a grave challenge. With the new UID (Unique Identification Number) one will be digitally enabled to vote. People who don’t want to make the trek from their homes to the polling booths or those who’re unable to do so for reasons of health or safety can use their UID to cast their vote.
- Lack of leadership qualities in many politician – It has always been about the leader. If the leader is good, non corrupt and displays enthusiasm , the voter will be there for him/her to vote.But over the time, the quality of Indian leadership has deteriorated and this created a gulf between ruled and ruler.Public cynicism perpetuated our society where we usually think the leaders are corrupt due to the various scandals and misuse of public authority or property from time to time.
Conclusion:-
It shall not be made compulsory rather than state must endeavor to find the cause why people do not exercise their franchise. A dis-satisfied citizenry looses hope in the system which results in his/her reduced engagement. In this situation if Voting is enforced compulsory it is likely to enhance the further dis-satisfaction. Hence, Voting should not be made compulsory but state need to find ways which increases the overall satisfaction of citizen and in result engagement will increase without coercion.Technology and better leadership are the solution , a legal solution to technical problems may render futile.
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On March 31, the World Economic Forum (WEF) released its annual Gender Gap Report 2021. The Global Gender Gap report is an annual report released by the WEF. The gender gap is the difference between women and men as reflected in social, political, intellectual, cultural, or economic attainments or attitudes. The gap between men and women across health, education, politics, and economics widened for the first time since records began in 2006.
[wptelegram-join-channel link=”https://t.me/s/upsctree” text=”Join @upsctree on Telegram”]No need to remember all the data, only pick out few important ones to use in your answers.
The Global gender gap index aims to measure this gap in four key areas : health, education, economics, and politics. It surveys economies to measure gender disparity by collating and analyzing data that fall under four indices : economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival, and political empowerment.
The 2021 Global Gender Gap Index benchmarks 156 countries on their progress towards gender parity. The index aims to serve as a compass to track progress on relative gaps between women and men in health, education, economy, and politics.
Although no country has achieved full gender parity, the top two countries (Iceland and Finland) have closed at least 85% of their gap, and the remaining seven countries (Lithuania, Namibia, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Rwanda, and Ireland) have closed at least 80% of their gap. Geographically, the global top 10 continues to be dominated by Nordic countries, with —Iceland, Norway, Finland, and Sweden—in the top five.
The top 10 is completed by one country from Asia Pacific (New Zealand 4th), two Sub-Saharan countries (Namibia, 6th and Rwanda, 7th, one country from Eastern Europe (the new entrant to the top 10, Lithuania, 8th), and another two Western European countries (Ireland, 9th, and Switzerland, 10th, another country in the top-10 for the first time).There is a relatively equitable distribution of available income, resources, and opportunities for men and women in these countries. The tremendous gender gaps are identified primarily in the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia.
Here, we can discuss the overall global gender gap scores across the index’s four main components : Economic Participation and Opportunity, Educational Attainment, Health and Survival, and Political Empowerment.
The indicators of the four main components are
(1) Economic Participation and Opportunity:
o Labour force participation rate,
o wage equality for similar work,
o estimated earned income,
o Legislators, senior officials, and managers,
o Professional and technical workers.
(2) Educational Attainment:
o Literacy rate (%)
o Enrollment in primary education (%)
o Enrollment in secondary education (%)
o Enrollment in tertiary education (%).
(3) Health and Survival:
o Sex ratio at birth (%)
o Healthy life expectancy (years).
(4) Political Empowerment:
o Women in Parliament (%)
o Women in Ministerial positions (%)
o Years with a female head of State (last 50 years)
o The share of tenure years.
The objective is to shed light on which factors are driving the overall average decline in the global gender gap score. The analysis results show that this year’s decline is mainly caused by a reversal in performance on the Political Empowerment gap.
Global Trends and Outcomes:
– Globally, this year, i.e., 2021, the average distance completed to gender parity gap is 68% (This means that the remaining gender gap to close stands at 32%) a step back compared to 2020 (-0.6 percentage points). These figures are mainly driven by a decline in the performance of large countries. On its current trajectory, it will now take 135.6 years to close the gender gap worldwide.
– The gender gap in Political Empowerment remains the largest of the four gaps tracked, with only 22% closed to date, having further widened since the 2020 edition of the report by 2.4 percentage points. Across the 156 countries covered by the index, women represent only 26.1% of some 35,500 Parliament seats and 22.6% of over 3,400 Ministers worldwide. In 81 countries, there has never been a woman head of State as of January 15, 2021. At the current rate of progress, the World Economic Forum estimates that it will take 145.5 years to attain gender parity in politics.
– The gender gap in Economic Participation and Opportunity remains the second-largest of the four key gaps tracked by the index. According to this year’s index results, 58% of this gap has been closed so far. The gap has seen marginal improvement since the 2020 edition of the report, and as a result, we estimate that it will take another 267.6 years to close.
– Gender gaps in Educational Attainment and Health and Survival are nearly closed. In Educational Attainment, 95% of this gender gap has been closed globally, with 37 countries already attaining gender parity. However, the ‘last mile’ of progress is proceeding slowly. The index estimates that it will take another 14.2 years to close this gap on its current trajectory completely.
In Health and Survival, 96% of this gender gap has been closed, registering a marginal decline since last year (not due to COVID-19), and the time to close this gap remains undefined. For both education and health, while progress is higher than economy and politics in the global data, there are important future implications of disruptions due to the pandemic and continued variations in quality across income, geography, race, and ethnicity.
India-Specific Findings:
India had slipped 28 spots to rank 140 out of the 156 countries covered. The pandemic causing a disproportionate impact on women jeopardizes rolling back the little progress made in the last decades-forcing more women to drop off the workforce and leaving them vulnerable to domestic violence.
India’s poor performance on the Global Gender Gap report card hints at a serious wake-up call and learning lessons from the Nordic region for the Government and policy makers.
Within the 156 countries covered, women hold only 26 percent of Parliamentary seats and 22 percent of Ministerial positions. India, in some ways, reflects this widening gap, where the number of Ministers declined from 23.1 percent in 2019 to 9.1 percent in 2021. The number of women in Parliament stands low at 14.4 percent. In India, the gender gap has widened to 62.5 %, down from 66.8% the previous year.
It is mainly due to women’s inadequate representation in politics, technical and leadership roles, a decrease in women’s labor force participation rate, poor healthcare, lagging female to male literacy ratio, and income inequality.
The gap is the widest on the political empowerment dimension, with economic participation and opportunity being next in line. However, the gap on educational attainment and health and survival has been practically bridged.
India is the third-worst performer among South Asian countries, with Pakistan and Afghanistan trailing and Bangladesh being at the top. The report states that the country fared the worst in political empowerment, regressing from 23.9% to 9.1%.
Its ranking on the health and survival dimension is among the five worst performers. The economic participation and opportunity gap saw a decline of 3% compared to 2020, while India’s educational attainment front is in the 114th position.
India has deteriorated to 51st place from 18th place in 2020 on political empowerment. Still, it has slipped to 155th position from 150th position in 2020 on health and survival, 151st place in economic participation and opportunity from 149th place, and 114th place for educational attainment from 112th.
In 2020 reports, among the 153 countries studied, India is the only country where the economic gender gap of 64.6% is larger than the political gender gap of 58.9%. In 2021 report, among the 156 countries, the economic gender gap of India is 67.4%, 3.8% gender gap in education, 6.3% gap in health and survival, and 72.4% gender gap in political empowerment. In health and survival, the gender gap of the sex ratio at birth is above 9.1%, and healthy life expectancy is almost the same.
Discrimination against women has also been reflected in Health and Survival subindex statistics. With 93.7% of this gap closed to date, India ranks among the bottom five countries in this subindex. The wide sex ratio at birth gaps is due to the high incidence of gender-based sex-selective practices. Besides, more than one in four women has faced intimate violence in her lifetime.The gender gap in the literacy rate is above 20.1%.
Yet, gender gaps persist in literacy : one-third of women are illiterate (34.2%) than 17.6% of men. In political empowerment, globally, women in Parliament is at 128th position and gender gap of 83.2%, and 90% gap in a Ministerial position. The gap in wages equality for similar work is above 51.8%. On health and survival, four large countries Pakistan, India, Vietnam, and China, fare poorly, with millions of women there not getting the same access to health as men.
The pandemic has only slowed down in its tracks the progress India was making towards achieving gender parity. The country urgently needs to focus on “health and survival,” which points towards a skewed sex ratio because of the high incidence of gender-based sex-selective practices and women’s economic participation. Women’s labour force participation rate and the share of women in technical roles declined in 2020, reducing the estimated earned income of women, one-fifth of men.
Learning from the Nordic region, noteworthy participation of women in politics, institutions, and public life is the catalyst for transformational change. Women need to be equal participants in the labour force to pioneer the societal changes the world needs in this integral period of transition.
Every effort must be directed towards achieving gender parallelism by facilitating women in leadership and decision-making positions. Social protection programmes should be gender-responsive and account for the differential needs of women and girls. Research and scientific literature also provide unequivocal evidence that countries led by women are dealing with the pandemic more effectively than many others.
Gendered inequality, thereby, is a global concern. India should focus on targeted policies and earmarked public and private investments in care and equalized access. Women are not ready to wait for another century for equality. It’s time India accelerates its efforts and fight for an inclusive, equal, global recovery.
India will not fully develop unless both women and men are equally supported to reach their full potential. There are risks, violations, and vulnerabilities women face just because they are women. Most of these risks are directly linked to women’s economic, political, social, and cultural disadvantages in their daily lives. It becomes acute during crises and disasters.
With the prevalence of gender discrimination, and social norms and practices, women become exposed to the possibility of child marriage, teenage pregnancy, child domestic work, poor education and health, sexual abuse, exploitation, and violence. Many of these manifestations will not change unless women are valued more.
[wptelegram-join-channel link=”https://t.me/s/upsctree” text=”Join @upsctree on Telegram”]2021 WEF Global Gender Gap report, which confirmed its 2016 finding of a decline in worldwide progress towards gender parity.
Over 2.8 billion women are legally restricted from having the same choice of jobs as men. As many as 104 countries still have laws preventing women from working in specific jobs, 59 countries have no laws on sexual harassment in the workplace, and it is astonishing that a handful of countries still allow husbands to legally stop their wives from working.
Globally, women’s participation in the labour force is estimated at 63% (as against 94% of men who participate), but India’s is at a dismal 25% or so currently. Most women are in informal and vulnerable employment—domestic help, agriculture, etc—and are always paid less than men.
Recent reports from Assam suggest that women workers in plantations are paid much less than men and never promoted to supervisory roles. The gender wage gap is about 24% globally, and women have lost far more jobs than men during lockdowns.
The problem of gender disparity is compounded by hurdles put up by governments, society and businesses: unequal access to social security schemes, banking services, education, digital services and so on, even as a glass ceiling has kept leadership roles out of women’s reach.
Yes, many governments and businesses had been working on parity before the pandemic struck. But the global gender gap, defined by differences reflected in the social, political, intellectual, cultural and economic attainments or attitudes of men and women, will not narrow in the near future without all major stakeholders working together on a clear agenda—that of economic growth by inclusion.
The WEF report estimates 135 years to close the gap at our current rate of progress based on four pillars: educational attainment, health, economic participation and political empowerment.
India has slipped from rank 112 to 140 in a single year, confirming how hard women were hit by the pandemic. Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only two Asian countries that fared worse.
Here are a few things we must do:
One, frame policies for equal-opportunity employment. Use technology and artificial intelligence to eliminate biases of gender, caste, etc, and select candidates at all levels on merit. Numerous surveys indicate that women in general have a better chance of landing jobs if their gender is not known to recruiters.
Two, foster a culture of gender sensitivity. Take a review of current policies and move from gender-neutral to gender-sensitive. Encourage and insist on diversity and inclusion at all levels, and promote more women internally to leadership roles. Demolish silos to let women grab potential opportunities in hitherto male-dominant roles. Work-from-home has taught us how efficiently women can manage flex-timings and productivity.
Three, deploy corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds for the education and skilling of women and girls at the bottom of the pyramid. CSR allocations to toilet building, the PM-Cares fund and firms’ own trusts could be re-channelled for this.
Four, get more women into research and development (R&D) roles. A study of over 4,000 companies found that more women in R&D jobs resulted in radical innovation. It appears women score far higher than men in championing change. If you seek growth from affordable products and services for low-income groups, women often have the best ideas.
Five, break barriers to allow progress. Cultural and structural issues must be fixed. Unconscious biases and discrimination are rampant even in highly-esteemed organizations. Establish fair and transparent human resource policies.
Six, get involved in local communities to engage them. As Michael Porter said, it is not possible for businesses to sustain long-term shareholder value without ensuring the welfare of the communities they exist in. It is in the best interest of enterprises to engage with local communities to understand and work towards lowering cultural and other barriers in society. It will also help connect with potential customers, employees and special interest groups driving the gender-equity agenda and achieve better diversity.