Right or Duty? Compulsory Voting in Australia

In a democracy, should voting be a citizen’s right or a citizen’s duty?

Australia is one of a small number of countries – including Argentina and Egypt – with mandatory voting. Australia is rare, within this small group of nations, in imposing penalties on citizens who fail to turn up to vote. Compulsory voting has been in place here since 1924 and it sets us apart from other advanced democracies. Less than 60% of the US voting-age population cast ballots in the 2016 presidential election.

For this conversation, we’ll bring together citizenship law expert Kim Rubenstein and the eminent historian Judith Brett, author of From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage: How Australia Got Compulsory Voting. They’ll trace the history of our voting system and examine how it’s shaped the tenor of our debates and our sense of ourselves and our representatives. With Sally Warhaft, they’ll discuss donkey votes, ballot boxes, barbeques and the wide-ranging implications of compulsory participation.