[EM] Quotas

[Greg Nisbet]

You will be represented whether you like it or not...

Some countries have women's quotas, racial quotas, geographical quotas etc.

What are your thoughts on these?

I think it is generally a bad idea to impose this sort of requirement
on the people. Manipulation of the will of the people "for their own
good" isn't right. The government, however enlightened it considers
itself, should not subvert the will of the people. It is important
that the legislature be accountable and completely under the control
of the people.

If electoral intervention bad is not a good enough argument... try this.

Who decides which groups are worthy of representation and which are
excluded from protection?

Wouldn't this procedure elect a suboptimal candidate? There is no
guarantee that the people's choice would be replaced by someone with
similar issues. This would prevent representation in cases where the
candidate mandated by the quota replaced a dissimilar candidate.

Does this help or hinder actual social change?

This is an important argument. It is not clear to me that women's
quotas make society less sexist, racial quotas less racist, or
geographical quotas less balkanized. Looking to the example of
geographical quotas that we have in the Untied States, it has fostered
regionalism, in fact. Pork barrel spending is at an all-time high and
congressmen bicker over policies based on which state they help or
hurt.