Democracy Beyond Secrecy: Assessing the Promises and Pitfalls of Collective Voting

Abstract

This paper assesses collective voting as a specific mode of democratic decision-making and compares it to secret voting. Under collective voting, voters gather in one place and decide by the show of hands. We theorise two potential advantages and two disadvantages of collective voting so defined. We then draw on original survey data from one of the largest polities practising collective voting, the citizen assembly of the Swiss canton of Glarus. We find that both the promises and pitfalls of non-secret voting are exaggerated. Non-secret voting’s suspected pitfalls – social pressure and abstention – do not generally materialise in our sample, although for women they do appear to be relevant to some extent. However, the promises of collective voting – enabling cue-taking and discursive bridging and bonding – are equally realised to a limited extent only.