Abstention_ The Unexpected Power of Withholding Your Vote弃权：意想不到的力量 扣留你的选票.pdf

Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University Scholarly Commons at Hofstra Law Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship 2010 Abstention: The Unexpected Power of Withholding Your Vote Grant M. Ha den Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra Uni ersity Follow this and additional works at : https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra. du/faculty_scholarship R comm nd d Citation Grant M. Hayd n, A bstention: The Unexp ected Power of Withholding Your Vote, 43 Conn. L. R v. 585 (2010) Available at : https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra. du/faculty_scholarship/560 This Article is brought to you for fr e and op n acc ss by Scholarly Commons at Hofstra Law. It has b n acc pt d for inclusion in Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship by an authoriz d administrator of Scholarly Commons at Hofstra Law. For more information, pl ase contact lawcls@hofstra. du. CONNECTICUT LAW REVIEW VOLUME 43 DECEMBER 2010 NUMBER 2 Article Abstention: The Unexpected Power of Withholding Your Vote GRANT M. HAYDEN This Article examines the effect of abstentionson the outcome of votes. Scholars (and voters) operate under two basic assumptions about the nature of abstention. First, they assume that an abstention affects all people assume that a alternativesin equal measure. Second, and relatedly, voterspreferred alternativewill be less likely to win if that voter abstains (and,of course, more likely to win if she votes). Removing thepotential full support of a vote and replacing it with thefifty-fifty proposition of an abstention should hurt the chances of a voters preferred alternative. These two assumptions guide the thinking on abstentions at all levels of democrat