Important reforms were recommended in November 2017 in the report “A Parliament That Works For Wales” by the Assembly`s Expert Group on Electoral Reform, led by Professor Laura McAllister. These included expanding the assembly, adjusting or changing the electoral system and, of course, lowering the voting age to 16. [62] In 2004, the UK Electoral Commission conducted a broad consultation on voting and candidacy age and received a meaningful response. In his conclusions, he recommended leaving the voting age at 18. [50] On November 29, 2005, the House of Commons voted 136-128 against a bill by Liberal Democrat MP Stephen Williams to lower the voting age to 16. When Parliament was passed in 2006, it decided not to include a provision on lowering the voting age in the Election Administration Act. Iran`s legislative body does not seem to be in a position to decide when it comes to the voting age in Iran. While the voting age in Iran currently coincides with most countries in the world, the minimum voting age in Iran before 2007 was only 15. It was changed to 18 in 2007 and again to 15 in 2009 after only two years. In 2011, the voting age in Iran returned to 18.
A figure representing the exact number of countries where voting is compulsory is completely arbitrary. The mere presence or absence of mandatory electoral laws in a constitution is far too simple. It is more constructive to analyze compulsory voting as a specter ranging from a symbolic but essentially impotent law to a government that systematically persecutes and punishes any citizen who does not vote. The legal voting age in Nicaragua, Scotland, the Isle of Man, Guernsey, Ethiopia, Ecuador, Cuba, Brazil and Austria is 16. However, this age has been criticized by most people, as young people of this age have not yet entered the world of employment, tax breaks and home ownership. Many voting decisions are thought to revolve around these three issues. Therefore, it is assumed that people over the age of 16 are not able to vote competently based on the policies of the leaders. Other critics, however, observe low voter turnout among those aged 18 and older due to the apparent lack of interest in politics. As such, they suggest that young people over the age of 16 can go to the polls in large numbers.
In Scotland`s 2014 independent referendum, the inclusion of 16- and 17-year-olds yielded positive results. Most of them, feeling unable to vote, decided to actively seek information that would allow them to make informed decisions on election day. This influenced Scotland`s decision to lower the legal voting age from 18 to 16. However, Austria was the first European country to lower the voting age in 2011. Below is a table with all countries that have a law that makes voting compulsory. The first column lists the name of the country, the second column the type of sanctions that the country in question imposes on non-voters, and the third column provides information on the extent to which compulsory voting laws are applied in practice. After all, the highest minimum voting age is 25. The only country that applies this is the United Arab Emirates. The United Arab Emirates elects its officials with an electoral college of 6,689 members. Members of the electoral college are appointed by the UAE and must be citizens of the emirate they are to vote for and must be 25 years of age or older, depending on the emirate.
They must also be able to read and write. The countries of Oman, Kuwait and Indonesia have not yet expressed interest in electing their police and army. Guatemala also bans active members of the armed forces from voting, and they are even confined to their barracks on election day. The Scottish National Party conference voted unanimously on 27 October 2007 in favour of a policy to lower the voting age to 16 (the age of majority in Scotland) and a campaign to transfer the necessary powers to the Scottish Parliament. [59] Demands to lower the voting age to 16 were again made by school strike activists for the climate movement in several countries (including Germany and the UK). [18] [19] Here are some questions and answers about how elections work and what is at stake: Brazil lowered the voting age in the 1988 constitution from 18 to 16. The 1989 presidential election was the first with the voting age lower. Persons between the ages of 18 and 70 have the right to vote. Men in military service who turned 19 during World War I were eligible to vote in 1918, regardless of age, under the People`s Representation Act of 1918, which also allowed some women over 30 to vote. The Representation of the People (Equal Suffrage) Act of 1928,[45] lowered the voting age for women to 21.
In 2013, the city of Takoma Park, Maryland, became the first place in the United States to lower the voting age for municipal elections and referendums to 16. [87] [88] In 2018, three other cities lowered the voting age to 16: Hyattsville and Greenbelt in Maryland and Berkeley in California (for school board elections only). [89] In 2018, a bill was proposed to the Council of the District of Columbia to lower the voting age to 16, which would make the Federal District the first jurisdiction to lower the voting age for federal elections. [90] When the right to vote was introduced in democracies, the voting age was generally set at 21 years or older. In the 1970s, many countries lowered the voting age to 18. Proposals to lower the voting age to 18 years or younger are currently under consideration in a number of countries. Der 26. The amendment to the Constitution (adopted and ratified in 1971)[80] prevents states from setting an electoral age above 18. [81] In addition to the express restrictions provided for in Amendments XIV, XV, XIX, and XXVI, elective qualifications for elections to the House of Representatives and the Senate are largely delegated to the states under Article I, Section 2 and Amendment XVII of the United States Constitution, each of which states: “The House of Representatives shall consist of the members of: elected every two years by the people of each state. and the electors of each state must have the necessary qualifications for the electors of the largest branch of the state legislature.
” and “The United States Senate shall consist of two senators from each state, elected by the people of that state, for a six-year term; and each senator has one vote. The electors of each state must have the necessary qualifications to respond to the electors of the largest branch of the state legislatures. [82] Some have been criticised for not lowering the voting age to 16 for the 2016 EU membership referendum. [56] [57] In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, the voting age was lowered to 18 in India, Switzerland, Austria, and Morocco. Japan lowered the voting age from 20 to 18 in June 2016. [6] Beginning in 2007, a dispute continued in the Maldives. [7] [8] On October 21, 2019, Green MP Bandt introduced a bill in the House of Representatives to lower the voting age to 16. [20] Venezuela renounced compulsory voting in 1993. A provision in the constitution that made voting compulsory remained in force until 1999. Nevertheless, the abolition of legal sanctions in 1993 marked the end of compulsory voting (Carey and Horiuchi, 2017). Voting was compulsory until 1973.
86% of the 237 countries on our list have a minimum voting age of 18. However, the 205 countries where their citizens must be at least 18 years old to vote are not all homogeneous when it comes to exceptions to the rule and history. Take Bosnia and Herzegovina, for example. The country has an 18-year-old voting age, but an exception to the rule is that 16-year-olds who are employed are also allowed to vote. In some countries where their citizens have to vote, voting is optional for illiterate people. These countries include Brazil and Ecuador. However, literacy rates in Brazil and Ecuador of over 92 per cent and over 94 per cent, respectively, do not mean that this is a major problem. Some countries do not agree to give police and military personnel the right to vote. The Dominican Republic prohibits all members of its police and army from participating in elections.
The Dominican Republic is not the only country to have done so, at least in the past. Peru used to ban all police and military personnel from participating in elections, but a 2005 constitutional reform removed this law and now police and military personnel can vote. Another consequence of mandatory voting is the possible high number of “random votes”. Voters who vote against their free will can randomly tick off a candidate, especially the Spitzenkandidat on the ballot. The voter does not care who he votes for, as long as the government is convinced that he has fulfilled his civic duty. How does this immeasurable category of random votes affect the legitimacy of the democratically elected government? Below is a list of political parties and other campaign organizations that have advocated lowering the voting age or advocating its abolition. Compulsory voting is not a new concept. Some of the first countries to introduce electoral laws were Belgium in 1892, Argentina in 1914 and Australia in 1924.