Free Essay. The Impact of Public Policies on Voter Participation

Public policies are laws and regulations that are put in place in line with the constitution. The government affects all aspects of the lives of its people. Therefore, it is vital to put in place measures that are committed to enhancing public participation. The commitment of the state and civic education is essential. Civic education enables the citizens to know what they are required to do and how they should do it. The commitment of the state ensures that nobody is above the law promotes order and gives all parties an equal room to participate. Supporting candidates and parties formed under political alliance gives people room to influence public policy. A favorable plan helps to increase voter participation while a negative one demotivates the turnout of voters.

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For democracy to be practiced well, the government needs to provide a fair representation. This can be promoted by allowing all eligible citizens to vote. The electoral process should be free, fair and secure. Participation in a country's election makes one a good citizen and gives them a feeling of belonging. A secure election can be achieved through streamlining the process, making it transparent and open (Kimball, David, and Joseph n.p). The government should provide enough resources in election periods and make sure that voting is accessible for all. This will increase the number of citizens willing to vote as it is transparent, accessible and honest.

A policy to ensure voter registration is streamlined and promotes voter participation. The streamlining helps to make voter registration more convenient hence increasing the number of those who cast their votes in elections. Many people are barred from the registration process due to a lack of adequate information about the registration process. It helps to curb language barriers, race, and other factors that may limit an individual from getting registered.

It is essential to ensure the participation of eligible voters through pro-voter policies and practices. This can be done by eliminating the existing barriers to registering to vote. The obstacles placed on citizens while registering to vote and also during the voting process should be eliminated. Good reforms should be drafted and implemented to allow eligible voters to cast their votes securely. In return, a mechanism should be adopted to ensure that all cast votes have been counted. The policy will help to increase voter participation.

The adoption of an automatic voter registration policy has a lot of benefits in the electoral process. It can lead to a high number of registering voters in a short period. It helps to shift the burden of voter registration from the citizen to the state. With the policy, the process is automatically updated. The citizens have a right to accept or decline the automatic registration that is sent to them via mail (Funk 443). Elimination of the disenfranchisement laws on ex-offenders would also increase the number of voters. It is essential to design civic engagement tools in a manner that encourages the voting process. This helps to re-recruit those people that had been alienated from the process. It helps to restore their faith into voting as they can now cast their voice into a vote.

Pre-registration of youth can also help improve voter participation. Once they have turned eighteen years, it is automatically activated. The pre-registration helps to reduce the gap in participation between different demographic groups. A policy that allows online voter registration is a good one. It helps to reduce the hassle of finding a physical location to conduct the process. It is accommodative for eligible voters with inflexible working hours and those that are transient. Those who register online are likely to participate in elections.

On the other hand, voter registration that is not well-communicated decrease voter participation. Arbitrarily, early registration decreases the number of voters registered. When people are not well informed about the whole process, they can easily get locked out of the process. The government needs to provide clear information to the people if they are registered or not. The step gives people enough time to go and get themselves registered or correct any error that may have occurred. A policy should be put in place to identify new eligible voters and also improve the accuracy of the voting procedure. The government can also implement same-day voter registration. The registration is done the same day that voters are casting their respective votes. The procedure helps to reduce confusion as the voters can cast their votes in any location that allows the voting process (Funk 429). Responsible leaders are also elected when people exercise their powers as voters. The voters can choose the leaders based on who they are and how they will serve the community, .in return, the leaders have to serve well as they are held accountable by the people who put them into power.

Conclusion

In summary, public participation is a right that every citizen should be allowed to practice. The government should put in place policies that are sound and reasonable to make the process accessible by all and transparent. The policies should also adhere to the needs of the citizens irrespective of their age group, race, or culture.

Works Cited

Funk, Patricia. "How accurate are surveyed preferences for public policies? Evidence from a unique institutional setup." Review of Economics and Statistics 98.3 (2016): 442-454. Retrieved from https://repositori.upf.edu/bitstream/handle/10230/19927/1334.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

Kimball, David C., and Joseph Anthony. "Voter participation with ranked-choice voting in the United States." annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, Philadelphia. 2016. Retrieved from http://www.umsl.edu/~kimballd/KimballRCV.pdf