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Story Publication logo September 23, 2024

Podcast: What Australia Can Teach the U.S. About Voting, Representation and Democracy

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A solutions-oriented look at how other countries are managing immigration and voter turnout

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Daniel Tucker, executive producer of the Reset podcast, traveled to Australia to study its voting and political systems. Here are the takeaways for Americans.


Australia has a rich history of changing its voting system to create a more representative government and a more democratic society.

As a result, voting is mandatory in Australia. Voters rank candidates from multiple parties, the Senate uses proportional representation, and an independent commission administers federal elections.

“All of these innovations play a kind of subconscious role in making people feel like their vote is worth it and that they have something to contribute,” says Bill Browne, director of the Democracy and Accountability program at the Australia Institute, an independent think tank.

In June, Reset executive producer Daniel Tucker talked to scholars, politicians, watchdogs, community organizers, and more in Australia to learn how these systems function. And to ask: Could they work in the U.S.?


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Mandatory registration and voting 

Australia introduced mandatory voter registration in 1911 and mandatory voting in 1924. When everyone is compelled to vote, turnout rises sharply and more people are represented.

Americans find a voting requirement onerous, but a majority of Australians support the idea, and it’s had many positive downstream effects on politics, government, and society.

Preferential voting aka “ranked-choice” 

In 1918, Australia adopted preferential voting. There are no primaries, and voters rank all the candidates running for a position. If someone does not win a majority, voters’ additional preferences are taken into consideration. It’s often called “ranked-choice voting” in the U.S.

Some right-leaning Aussie politicians view it as unfair. Politicians from other parties, and many scholars, say it leads to winners who have the widest possible support.

Preferential voting has been adopted in many Democrat-led U.S. cities and a few states. Since 2022, 10 Republican-led states have banned the system.

Proportional representation in the Senate

In the 1940s, Australia’s Senate adopted proportional representation (PR).

PR ensures that a full spectrum of views is present in the Senate. As a result, no one party reigns and politicians must work together across party lines.

The version used in Australia is the top voting system in the world for local representation and voter choice, according to the nonpartisan Electoral Reform Society.

While PR is the fastest-growing form of democratic government around the world, it doesn’t really exist in the U.S., though some advocates say it could transform U.S. politics.

An independent electoral commission

Australian federal elections are administered by an independent, nonpartisan commission.

In the American system, thousands of states, counties, and cities are involved in storing, sorting, and counting ballots, creating confusion at times, and in the case of the 2020 election, providing a breeding ground for election disinformation.

Aussies know the Australian Electoral Commission by name. It gets very high marks from the public. And its practices help build legitimacy and trust around elections.

Notably, due to the way the AEC operates, two problems that plague American politics — voter suppression and gerrymandering — effectively do not exist in Australia.

Podcast guests:

Judith Brett, author of From Secret Ballot To Democracy Sausage: How Australia Got Compulsory Voting

Samantha Ratnam, member of parliament in the state of Victoria for the Greens

Nick Minchin, former finance minister, former Liberal leader in the Senate

Shane Singh, professor of international affairs at the University of Georgia, author of the book Beyond Turnout: How Compulsory Voting Shapes Citizens and Political Parties

Tom Rogers, Australian Electoral Commissioner

Bill Browne, director of the Democracy and Accountability program at the Australia Institute, an independent think tank in Canberra

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