Ethical Dilemmas In The Voting System

In a Democratic economy, people elect their representatives through the system of voting. The choice of electing a strong government is always there in people’s hands. As much as casting the vote to a righteous government is important, it’s equally or more important that it is done right. The decision of forming the ruling government is based on the vote count and there is a high risk of voter fraud to take place during elections. Casting vote on others behalf or rigging to increase the vote share of the favorable candidate leads to a complete failure of democracy. Presenting a valid ID at the time of voting will eliminate voter fraud to a great extent and helps to maintain credibility in the decision made.

There might be questions like, is

asking a valid ID to cast their vote is insulting to the voter? And what about people who cannot effort a valid ID, are they not eligible to vote? These are the main ethical issues which were raised by civil groups when the concept of “Voter ID laws” were brought before the public in the year 2000 in the United States. Although many states in the US have implemented this system in the later period, a considerable number of states are still not convinced with the system of presenting valid ID at the time of voting.
It is acceptable that this system has few concerns- people who have no record of their backgrounds like birth certificates and people who are very old cannot obtain ID for the reasons like no supporting documents and too old to walk down to offices etc. It may be difficult to solve this problem but, it is definitely not impossible. In countries like India, this system was implemented successfully, no person can vote without a government issued ID called “Voter ID”.
If one is not offended when they were asked for an ID proof at the time of purchasing alcohol, why it is questionable at the time of voting?

Ethical theory of consequentialism says that, if the ultimate goal is morally right then any action taken towards achieving the goal is ethical – “the ends justify means”. In this situation, enforcing a process to validate the voter is to be considered as a critical step to eliminate voter fraud and as not an act of restricting one from their right to vote. We can say, from the theory of consequentialism point of view, asking to present valid ID is ethical.

Any new law or system will have both pros and cons at the point of implementation. Similarly presenting a valid ID in a way prevents voter fraud but also causes trouble to the poor, unsheltered and old aged people as these people cannot pay for the application process and few might not have any supporting information etc., Instead of dodging the problem the government its best if we find a long term resolution. Government could come up with solutions like – issuing special ID cards to the people who do not have supporting documents, collect data by arranging electoral drives in crucial areas and for those who might have genuine logistic issues to get to the government facility, providing call and enroll facility.. With the latest technology, photos, biometrics, scanning of the docs with the high level of security and scrutiny is possible at the fingertips of a smartphone. We might

rather come up with innovative ideas and use technology to resolve the issues than let them pass by and give an opportunity to jeopardize the democracy itself.
In today’s world media plays a pivotal role. Media should promote benefits more than the problems. Good things happen as the system evolves and it’s important to achieve long term sustainable and successful model than to look for a workaround for short term issues. If new things stopped just because of few drawbacks, no system will progress. Accept changes with drawbacks, always drawbacks can be handled when something good is going to happen. Eliminating any risk is part of risk management and thus, presenting valid ID is part of risk management and ethical.