Edited by Jaiden Leary and Meghan Taylor
In the 2024 election, identity politics played a decisive role for many voters, the Democratic party focused more on social issues such as trans rights, LGBTQ+ issues, racial issues, and discrimination towards women. While these issues were important and necessary to address, they shaped too much of the party’s focus on minority communities. Meanwhile, Republicans—despite offering no coherent or substantiated policy platform—focused more on “economic choice” to sway voters in critical swing states. Many key groups—such as blue-collar workers, Hispanic and Black communities, and immigrants—were drawn to this focus where they were able to focus on economic based policies to sway them over. In fact, the numbers show that compared to 2020, Trump increased his voter support among men by 9 points, women by 4 points, voters 18-45 by 17 points, Latino women by 7 points and Latino men by 12 points, 1 point by young black women, and lastly, 10 points from young black men. This strategy ultimately delivered a sweeping Republican victory in both the White House and Congress. Now, it’s time to consider two key reforms that should shape the Democratic Party’s electoral future: Voter Turnout and Democratic Socialist policies.
The Voter Turnout Crisis
First, let’s analyze one of the central problems in the 2024 election for the Democratic Party: voter turnout. It was recorded that the turnout of voters was roughly 63.7%, down from the previous election cycle by 2.9% or slightly more than 9.86 million people. Even states like Minnesota, which had the highest percentage in both cycles 2020 and 2024, coming in at ~76.4%, was down compared to 2020 which recorded 79.8% or a 195,000 voter decrease. So what discouraged these voters from showing up at the polls? Well, it’s complicated, and there’s no “one” right answer, but one large factor is disillusionment with the current political climate.
Understanding Disillusionment
For this article, disillusionment is defined as a loss of trust or faith due to unmet expectations, it is caused by multiple things: feeling powerless, lack of choices, socioeconomic disenfranchisements, cynicism and more. In fact, voter apathy caused by disillusionment is so bad that some voters even swear off voting because candidates don’t represent their best interest and refuse to legitimize a system that inherently works against the people. This trend has been clear for decades—66% in 2020 was the highest turnout since the early 20th century. Now,obviously, it would be nearly impossible to raise voter turnout in our current climate to dramatically raise the percentages, but if the left needs more voters to either: A) swing their way or B) start to engage within politics at greater rates. What’s the answer? It’s nuanced. There’s 2 key points of analysis that the left (and even right) needs to take more seriously: Democratic Socialism and Compulsory Voting.
Democratic Socialism: Misunderstood but Necessary
So first of all let’s break down each of the terms, because it seems to get misconstrued by opponents of the ideology. Socialism is commonly characterised by “social ownership of the means of production” which would look like the opposite of liberal or state capitalism, where private ownership runs rampant. Now one thing to differentiate is Democratic socialism, which would be run by the people’s government in America but aim to achieve a reduction of inefficient capital models and profit accumulation, and State Capitalism, where the government intervenes in the market to act as “for profit” actors. The goal of democratic socialism is to embed democratic norms in the economy and prioritize people over profit, typically through gradual shifts from capitalism. So if we now understand socialism, what does that look like within the real world? These ideas are visible in economic proposals like the Green New Deal (GND), and equitable, affordable housing. However, most people don’t know that it expands farther than that. Many political and social policies include: Expanding safety nets and benefits (i.e. SNAP, medicaid, etc), reproductive rights, gender equality, DEI-like polices, immigration reform, and even election reform. But, if we know the policies that need to occur, how can we try to ensure that more people get their voices heard? Well, to start, higher wages.
Many Americans have major problems with the affordability of healthcare, the current state of education and covering the bills for basic necessities like energy. Whereas countries in the EU can be seen as combating these types of issues by implementing policies like universal healthcare and education funding through taxes, other countries such as Bolivia use redistributive policies to target poverty and inequality at its source. All of these are keen examples of real life policies influenced by democratic socialist ideology. So the question to beg is, would this be favorable in America? Well, surprisingly, young people, who voted less often than older generations in the last cycles, had a 62% approval rating of socialist policies. Given the recent NYC Democratic primary of the mayoral race, it’s clear that a new shift is occurring within younger generations, but if these are the right policies, how can we ensure more people have the opportunity to support them?
Compulsory Voting: A Radical but Realistic Solution
This is where compulsory voting comes into play, a system that makes it required by law to vote, or pay a fine. One of the biggest examples is Australia, where imposing a fine around $20-$50 has boosted engagement to not dip below 90%. Typically, these are nationwide holidays, similar to election day in the US, with expanded accessibility and more locations that provide availability to vote which typically harms Americans that are far from polls, or work during the hours of a typical polls hour. Of course, the logistics would need to be adjusted for the American electoral system, but the benefits would stay constant. Turnout rises, marginalized groups regain a voice, and can bring more change for people to continue their education of the politicians.
Now one big concern with this is that it would “infringe on someone’s right to not vote”, but we would say this is inherently always going to be around. Civic participation is typically required in most countries including the U.S. (e.g Taxes, Jury duty, etc) and seen as something you consent to by being a member of the country. Another common misconception is that “if I cannot vote because of religious views” or “if I’m unavailable to physically vote on that date” I would get punished as well, which is untrue. There are exceptions to where you would be exempt from voting and paying the fine, however it forces people who are able to vote to participate in their society instead of letting a smaller part of the country continuously have say over the policies. In retrospect, countries tend to govern more effectively when voter participation is high, and for democrats if you are able to adapt to more favourable policies and get them into the ballot boxes, an election cycle should be an incredibly preferable world.
A New Path Forward
Here’s the takeaway: These policies may not become widespread in America anytime soon,and would require more external help (such as abolishing the electoral college) to fully fight voter apathy and disillusionment. So while sweeping changes won’t happen overnight, the Democratic Party can’t afford to ignore the rising tide of economic discontent and youth engagement, especially if they want wins in further ballot boxes.
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