Voting is only one among many ways that citizens can participate in public decision-making, so why does it occupy such a central place in the democratic imagination? This book supplies an answer to this question, with an eye toward two goals: rebuffing radical criticisms of electoral democracy and guiding efforts at electoral reform.
Elections are periodic occasions for approximately universal participation. As such, they simultaneously dramatize the nature of democracy as a collective undertaking, while also rendering concrete and transparent the terms of equal citizenship and the dignity of individuals.
These occasions realize unique aspects of democratic values and perform essential functions in democratic communities
This account of popular voting’s purposes shows that fully realizing the value of elections depends not merely on widespread opportunity to vote, but also on consistently high levels of actual turnout. And citizens’ experience of voting matters as much as the formal properties of a voting system. These insights offer guidance for many areas of electoral reform, from the standards we use to assess healthy party politics, to the timing of elections and location of polling places. Recovering the full value of voting in today’s democracies requires rethinking what citizens experience on and around Election Day.
Emilee Chapman 