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Essay on Online Voting in a Digital Age
The dramatic impact of the internet has led to discussion of e-democracy and online voting. Some early enthusiasts declared that the internet could replace representative democracy, enabling everyone to vote on everything and anything at the push of a button. Such visions oversimplified the democratic process. Others have argued that e-voting could reduce costs and increase turnout by making voting more convenient.
Advantages of online voting
Proponents of online voting have argued that it could increase voter turnout, however, this is by no means certain. Only a minority of the USA population has home internet access (35%), and many of those who do not vote are unlikely to have ready access to computers. Home internet uptake has been rapid (faster than TV in the 1950s) and the proposed switch-off of analogue TV by the end of the decade could result in near-universal access to interactive services via digital TV. But how far such an increase in ease of voting would feed through into greater turnout is unclear. Supporters also cite a number of other advantages:
- Convenience. People are increasingly using the internet for transactions, and through its USA Online project, the Government aims to deliver all its services to citizens online by 2005. Online voting would add to the convenience of being a citizen.
- It may particularly appeal to younger voters (among whom voter turnout has tended to be particularly low).
- Online voting systems can identify if voters attempt to vote for the wrong number of candidates and notify them accordingly (this was a problem with punch cards in Florida in the 2000 elections).
- Online voting could allow more information to be displayed about candidates and their policies. But this would conflict with existing laws about not campaigning in the immediate vicinity of a polling place and would need to be strictly supervised (Bruce, 2003)....
