[spaginal]

Disengaged voters will simply vote for the current leadership or loudest guy, typically the same thing, without a thought towards the issues.

Strongmen love compulsory voting, it creates a false perception of legitimacy, because corruption or no corruption, if only 30% of a population is engaged in the issues and the other 70% could give two shits, that is a slamdunk for incumbents.

[Aerroon]

There's some evidence for this. Chile adopted voluntary voting in 2012. According to this study[0] this decreased the incumbent's advantage in the elections that follower.

[0] https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-political-s...

[kylebyproxy]

Agreed on all points.

Parent's assertion that "Voting at all in an unegaged populace is bad." still rubs me the wrong way.

Why discount the votes of engaged individuals just because the masses aren't? Baby, bath water, etc.