So, why has Canada gone down to 77th in the world in voter turnout?
We are tuning out and telling ourselves and our civil service that politics don’t matter.
Next Monday we go to the polls.
Maybe 68.4 percent of us who can vote, will.
This election the turnout could slip as low as 58 percent.
That is pause for thought.
Like a dripping faucet, Canada is losing its electorate.
We rank 77th in voter turnout, or 68.4 per cent, compared with other countries since the end of the Second World War according to an international survey by the Stockholm-based International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. We’re behind countries as unique as their concerns, including Israel, Argentina, Congo and Iceland — so we can’t blame the weather.
Voter apathy is occurring across the globe and the number one reason people don’t vote is because they don’t believe it matters.
I don’t really care about who is running in this election. Truth is, I’m glad we have only a week to go. I’m not interested in the candidates, locally or nationally. And although this hasn’t been a single issue election campaign, it feels and sounds that way.
The platforms seem to be propped up with rotting words.
Liberal
Conservative
NDP
Bloc Quebecois
Green
This election is a civic chore. I’m tired of the babble, bluster and blithering.
I’m voting, not because it is my right, but because it is a responsibility.
I’m not particularily proud of my attitude, but there it is.
I don’t know if a sense of responsibility would be a sustainable reason to participate election after election. I’ll vote. And I openly admit, I don’t think I’m voting this time because I believe it matters.
Bureaucrats run Ottawa, our provinces and our municipalities. Not us, and not our politicans.
Odd. We’ll have a minority government, and logistically I know a vote does matter.
If I could say anything to Ottawa it would be this…
Enjoy the summer, and give us time to do the same. Then, get to work. Cut down on the bloat, the blows and the bleating, and show some self-respect and other respect. Show us that serving others is important again, okay?
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Do you know where you can get the full leauge of voter turnouts
Hey Ande:
For Canada?
Or world wide?
http://www.idea.int/
You got it, Bene.
I want to say to Parliament, “Look. Its time you folks started working together. Government - you’re supposed to bring into effect legislation that will help this country to be the best it can be. Opposition… your task is to be “Her Majesty’s LOYAL Opposition”… you are the one who looks for holes and weak spots in the legislation - points them out - gets them strengthened before they are put into effect. If *all* of you would worry about ‘good governance’ rather than spending time figuring out how to ‘get the other guy’, we’d be in a much better place. And I, for one, would be even more willing to go to the polls and vote.”
*sigh*
Thanks for letting me rant, Bene.
Blessings and peace.
Rant away.
I’m promise if I’m elected I’ll listen to you.:^)
I’m disappointed with the rhetoric as well. I’ve already voted; just waiting for the results now.
I have a plan - if we bought all the politicians “It’s all about me” t-shirts and they have to wear them election day do you think they will get the message? Probably not.
Or the T-shirt, “I may not be perfect but I am Canadian.” You’ve got the ‘not perfect’ part down pat candidates!
You are so right about voter apathy. In the long term…….yawn - nap time.
I’m not voting. I’m fed up. I don’t believe my vote will make a difference. I’m sick and tired of voting for the lesser of two evils. I’m sick and tired of politicians who lie and also the media spin. I’m thankful that whoever gets in there will be a semblance of law and order in Canada. We have no anarchy. We have no military regime. But I don’t think voting really makes any difference anymore. I can’t trust what the movers and shakers say. I’m an agnostic Canadian citizen for the moment.
And we have an election coming up downunder too. No date yet. It doesn’t have to be till April 2005, but my guess is sometime in spring this year. Political parties are already sniping at one another and accusing othrs of stealing their policies. Ho,hum!
Shalom,
Jan
68%’s not bad, especially when we’re lucky to get 50% in the US. Some other countries, like Australia, fine people who don’t vote, so the deck might be stacked against North Americans.
You could also argue that it may be as much contentment as apathy; the next Canadian election won’t change government that much. The likely Conservative-BQ coalition will probably send some things down to the provincial level, but the core of the Canadian political and economic system will be largely unchanged.
Hey Bene, they heard you! Advance poll numbers are way up!! (Either that or people are planning to be on vacation when the foolishness ends… oops sorry - I mean election day).
I don’t know what it’s like in Canada but in the US many of us don’t vote because our vote doesn’t really accomplish much. There’s only a dime’s worth of difference between the only two parties in American politics that have any chance of winning an election. We tend to feel that its just not worth the effort. Despite what all the political blogs would have you think, the nation won’t collapse OR experience untold prosperity whether Democrats or Republicans are “in charge” of America. Really, the only place where the individual’s vote can count in any way is in local politics. And people wonder why voters are apathetic. Democratic Republics aren’t the modern whizbang wonder they’re cracked up to be.
It’s hard to get excited about making a difference in voting when Ontario & Quebec control the elections anyway — we sometimes even know who the winner is before the polls close out West.
Makes it hard not to get cynical about “democracy” in Canada when two provinces run the whole show.
But I’ll still vote, because I’ll have no right to bitch if I don’t participate in the process.
i totally agree with trish… as usual
I think that it is the responsibility of the federal government to work on the have/have not perceptions.
The majority of the electorate lives in Ontario and Quebec.
It is a national sport to rail against Ottawa.
I think this election has shown us how small our thinking is. This country is too big to make a national election about personalities.
We know we are going to have a minority government. It’s up for grabs who the king makers will be. If I remember correctly we’ve had 8 minority federal governments. They’ve lasted under two years.
However this country choses to deal with the 21st century, demanding structural changes at the federal level isn’t going to be optional.