Is there anything wrong with voting for nobody? Not abstaining or spoiling but keeping the voting slip blank. This is the premise for Seeing & the answer seems to be that it is only wrong if enough people do it.
What is wrong with voting for nobody is that if enough people do it nobody gets elected & government is effectively blanked, which for politicians is a tragedy.
It raises an interesting scenario about what could happen if politics were voted out of the political system. The politicians panic warning the public that politics is needed to safeguard the interests of the people even if they are not interested in politics. A state of seige is called for & the government with various leaders of political parties decamp from the city leaving the citizens to live their lives without the law to protect them. Uniforms are taken off & life continues no more or less worse.
Politics, it seems, was an ineffectual & unesscarry element in the ordinary life of people. Politics was there to protect politians.
Following on Blindness it continues the theme of political blindness in the form of blank voting the first cause of which, for both cases, were never discovered. The government needing answers & solutions to this widespread mystery try a range of stratagies for discovery. The actions of the government become more & more dubious until in an emotional scene the police officer following their orders changes his mind about the goodness of their motives.
The indicment against the government, which here in Saramago’s fable style implies all democratically elected governments, & beaurcracies in general is continual but his faith in people uninvolved in politics is generous for one so cynical. It is impossible, or vastly improbable, to imagine a scenario like this to really happen in reality or for large cities to unresverdly reject politicians & to be able to live without politics totally; but to be able to live without red-tape, without forms or insurances is a beautiful idea although I feel certain that it would be much more riskier than the world he has presented here.
What is wrong with voting for nobody is that if enough people do it nobody gets elected & government is effectively blanked, which for politicians is a tragedy.
It raises an interesting scenario about what could happen if politics were voted out of the political system. The politicians panic warning the public that politics is needed to safeguard the interests of the people even if they are not interested in politics. A state of seige is called for & the government with various leaders of political parties decamp from the city leaving the citizens to live their lives without the law to protect them. Uniforms are taken off & life continues no more or less worse.
Politics, it seems, was an ineffectual & unesscarry element in the ordinary life of people. Politics was there to protect politians.
Following on Blindness it continues the theme of political blindness in the form of blank voting the first cause of which, for both cases, were never discovered. The government needing answers & solutions to this widespread mystery try a range of stratagies for discovery. The actions of the government become more & more dubious until in an emotional scene the police officer following their orders changes his mind about the goodness of their motives.
The indicment against the government, which here in Saramago’s fable style implies all democratically elected governments, & beaurcracies in general is continual but his faith in people uninvolved in politics is generous for one so cynical. It is impossible, or vastly improbable, to imagine a scenario like this to really happen in reality or for large cities to unresverdly reject politicians & to be able to live without politics totally; but to be able to live without red-tape, without forms or insurances is a beautiful idea although I feel certain that it would be much more riskier than the world he has presented here.
