This post on the other hand is about my beef with the way people vote in France; not in the political sense of the word, but ecologically, or should I say, un-ecologically.
The very first time I was confronted with this issue was when I was still studying at Creteil University back in 2003 and the student body elections came up. When I arrived at the registration booth, I was signed in and then pointed towards a table where 12 different piles of half-page ballots where waiting for me. I must have looked pretty confused because the lady at the booth quickly explained to me that each pile represented a candidate (18 candidates in total) and that I was to select a ballot from each pile, go into the voting booth and only place the ballot of my choice candidate in the envelope she was handing me, throwing the rest of the ballots in the wastebasket, before coming out of the booth and casting my vote.
There must have been 1000 slips of printed ballots for each candidate pile.
Needless to say, I was appalled.
That night I remember coming home to Hubby (back then only Boyfriend) fumes coming out of my head and telling him all about those stupid University student body elections and how somebody should send Greenpeace after their finite-resources-wasting-butts.
And that’s when he told me “but honey, that the way all elections in France are conducted”.
Come again, WHAT????
Since that day, a couple of Presidential elections have gone by, as well as Mairie elections, Deputé elections, Departaments elections, Canton elections, Party elections, Union elections and many others. Each time, we systematically get a piece of paper (sorry, ballot) in the mail for each candidate and the voting process is always the same. The amount of wasted paper is mind boggling…. And I’m not even talking about the amount of publicity brochures and posters that are systematically printed out and distributed all over town for each candidate.
Every time, I raise my voice to the level of my indignation (meaning pretty high up), and every time I get the same puzzled look: “ehm… well, what ozer alternative zoo you suggest mademoiselle?” - Uhm, hellooooooooooo! Do I have to draw it out in pictures?????
Ok, I guess do, but just because I love using Power Point, ok?
In short, this is the way people vote in France:
Now, this on the other hand, is the way people vote in Mexico.
See a difference? I do. I see about a 500% cutback of the amount of wasted paper difference!!!
The first time I told Hubby how moronic I found his country’s voting system he told me this was the only infallible way to avoid any confusion at the moment of counting the votes (I forgot to mention that each candidate’s ballot is printed in boldly different colors), this way nobody ever "accidentally" votes for the wrong candidate.
Thump! (that’s the sound of my jaw dropping to the floor by the way)
Forgive me for being a little harsh here honey, but if someone is dumb enough that ticking a box represents so great a challenge that thousands of trees need to be pointlessly sacrificed instead… I’m not really sure that person should be allowed to vote in the first place. I mean, how hard can reading a name, ticking a box, folding a sheet of paper and slipping it into a voting booth be for crying out loud???
The second argument I often get is that you only take into the voting booth with you the ballots of the candidate you’re going to vote for (hello? What ever happened to voting is confidential? – those ballots are always placed in clear sight of everyone); or else you only grab the ballots of the candidates you still can’t decide who to vote for. Oh right, because, looking at all those different colored slips of paper is definitely going to help you make up your mind more than looking at the names (or party logos) of all the candidates printed on the same ballot!
I just can’t get it people! How can something soooooo unequivocally wrong still continue to be widely accepted? Do you know how many people voted in the 2007 French Presidential elections? Almost 37.4 million people (Wikipedia)! And do you know how many Parties were running in the race? 12!! Oh, and did I mention that Presidential elections (as well as a few other important ones) are actually held in two rounds! Once to select the two top candidates and another to have one elected with more than 50% of the votes.
DO THE MATH!
That's a whole $#!£§& load of printed ballots... for nothing!
So what brought all this on you ask? Well, in case you're not aware of it, the European Deputies’ Elections are being held this weekend and guess what just came in the mail this evening?
I’m sure the Amazon Forest really has a spot in its heart for the French.
Fned.
20 comments:
hear hear!!! A cause!!! Send your blog to the deputies who are up for election!!! or at least send the link... if that doesn't work go to the next level!!! Because, how this can be happening??? SAVE THE TREES, PEOPLE!!!!
Isn't it odd how something that makes no sense to someone from outside the culture can seem obvious and normal because it is how it has always been done?
It took me awhile to get the logic of having the desired person's name X'd out in flyers here in MX. I understand that it's to show you to put an X there but it just looked like a big NO to me. I'm really happy that I don't get the piles of trees made into election flyers in the US anymore. I get a few here stuck in the door but nothing like the heaps that came for every election up north.
I saw something on the news about electronic voting machines, and the French were having none of it. Apparently the screens were too small to read or something. So maybe that's their argument against checking the box ballot, too many names, written so small, oh how confusing! They just love their paperwork too much.
Though it is nice how they automatically get registered to vote and get their card at 18, not like in the states where you have to register yourself, so it's a lot more trouble and that's why a lot don't.
I'm sorry to contradict you on this one, but all the ballots, envelopes, posters and eveything else are made either from recycled paper or from undergrowth brush.
And most of these ballots are recycled again after the elections.
You don't seem to be aware that in France we grow our own forests for the paper market, and we certainly don't use trees from the rainforest!!
And yes, this is the best way to minimize problems when counting the ballots (remember when Florida had to review all the holes punched in the ballots during the 2000 presidential elections? Or when people had punched a hole in front of one candidate's name, and their vote was counted for another candidate?).
How about we talk about the never ending presidential election campaign in the US, with candidates jumping from one plane to another to attend meetings all over the country. How much CO2 is that do you think?
Ah, the French are such an easy target, aren't they?!!
You wrote :
I’m sure the Amazon Forest really has a spot in its heart for the French
Indeed your indignation is only equalled by your ignorance. Not a single Amazon forest tree is used to make those ballots. They are all made with recycled paper or with saw-dust, or with very poor brush-trees. And they are recycled again after the election.Even the higher quality paper used for letter paper doesn't come from forest trees but from poplar groves which are grown for this sole purpose. We may add that the whole of the ballots and party literature used for such an election doesn't even amount to the quantity of paper used in ONE day to print national newspapers (which by the way have a legal obligation to use 25% recycled paper). It's easy to say that the grass is greener at home but quite honestly I think that the Mexican system offers less safety as far as fraud is concerned. As for the American system you may have forgotten that in spite of the use of machines the first election of G.W.Bush was a world joke when it took weeks to decide who had won in Florida, with heavy suspicion of fraud as if it were taking place in an underdevelopped country.
Ok, just a couple of things...
a) The author does have a point in here... even if it is recycled paper, is it really necessary to waste so much paper just to cast your ballot? Recycled or not, it still looks to me as an unecessary waste. Am I to believe that this is the only way to ensure a transparent electoral process? Yeah, let's compare it to the American system that is heavily flawed, but why don't you compare it to the German one, for example? Two little pieces of paper, and that's it. I think people are smart enough to cross a little box in just one page instead of wasting tons and tons of paper on each election.
b) Contrary to what some people say or believe, the Mexican electoral system is regarded by the international community as being quite reliable and transparent. Actually, it was the Mexican Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) who, under the command of the UN, organised and trained electoral officials in the national elections of Afghanistan and Iraq. Various electoral systems in emerging democracies have been modeled after the Mexican one. Believe it or not.
PS. Love your blog Fned! Keep up the good work! :D
@Anonymous: Fned may very well have her point on the question, but she doesn't have to prove it with a series of false facts, and by making fun of the French and thinking that we are just the worst morons on earth!!!
Ok, first of all, I owe Danièla and Isabelle (and the French for that matter) an apology as I have to admit I was pretty harsh in my post and they’re right, I didn’t really do that much research on the recycled paper issue (thanks for that one ladies –je me coucherai moins bête ce soir!). I got back last night after a very long day and coming home to find our mailbox stuffed with all that paper simply made me loose it. By the time I sat down at the computer it was well past midnight and I was hungry and angry and exhausted (not a good cocktail for blogging it seems).
However, I simply cannot agree with you in that using so much paper is absolutely necessary to ensure a secure and valid vote. I didn’t compare the French system to the American because quite frankly I’ve never voted while on American soil. But I did compare it to the Mexican because I think they’re on the right track. It really can’t be that hard to just select one name on a sheet of paper, can it? After all, the recounting of the votes is manual both in France and in Mexico, so the margin of error shouldn’t be all that different, should it?
But ok, you don’t like the Mexican voting way… I get it. Let’s then see if we can reach an alternative consensus.
How’s this?
If the only way to make sure that no mistakes are made during the recount of the votes is by using individual slips for each candidate, then how about printing one SINGLE ballot with little tabs that can be torn off for EACH candidate? That way, only one paper ballot is needed per voter and he/she still only needs to slip in a single candidate’s name into the envelope, therefore eliminating waste AND error margin???
What does everyone think?
And Anon: That's really amazing about the IFE... I didn't know that either! Thanks (and glad you like the blog!) !! :D
Fned.
@Fned and Anonymous : I am not saying that all is perfect in France and we probably can improve a lot but quite frankly I do think that the issue of the ballots is a minor point. As for the Mexican voting system I have nothing against it but I was under the impression that there was a lot of doubt about the fairness of the last presidential election.
I like the tone of your answer Fned and obviously you are someone one can discuss with, so please keep in mind that France is certainly not the country that wastes the most.
One more word if I may, you tend to think that there are elections every other week in France. I just wish to remind you that european ,presidential, general, regional elections take place every five years and local (mairie) elections are held every six years. Trade Union elections do not take place so often and concern only a tiny minority of people as France is the industrial country with the smallest number of Union members in the world.
Hi Daniéla, I appreciate you coming back and thank you for your message. Although it's true that the previous presidential Mexican election was anything but pristine clean, the problems encountered weren't based on the type of ballots used, but more on the way the votes were counted and the dubious tactics that were used for a political agenda. Unfortunately for my country, having a greener voting system doesn't necessarily mean having a less corrupted one.
And yes, I agree with you that voting in France is not carried out every year (although I would say that at least every three years a major type of vote of some kind does take place in France or so has been my experience in the past 7 years of living here). Still, as minimum as the effort in avoiding waste may seem in this case, we have to start somewhere, don't you think? Imagine if by the next presidential election, we have come up with a way to cut down on voting ballots so that instead of distributing 37.7 million pieces of paper we only use one twelf of that ammount... don't you think that's worth a shot?
Fned.
My faith has been restored! Impressive to find out that the paper used is all recycled and recycled again - and that forests are actually grown for this purpose???? Also impressive how the communication flows so amicably on this blog, in spite of cultural differences! Admirable debating, and definitely an excellent read.
Fned, I don't understand your idea about printing the names of the candidates on one single ballot and then tearing appart the candidate's name that you want to vote for... For the european elections, in the Ile de France, there are 28 different lists of candidates. How do you print 28 names on one single ballot? How huge will this piece of paper be? Same thing if we had to tick a box in front of a name, it seems difficult when there are so many candidates!!!
I'd like Anonymous to explain us how the european elections are organized in Germany, how many ballots will the Germans find in the voting places, how many lists do they have, since they have to elect 99 european deputies... (we are going to elect 72 of them in France).
You also write that the Mexican system is greener. I have absolutely nothing against the Mexican system, but I'll agree that it's greener if you tell me that they use recycled or poor quality paper, made from brush-trees that grow in Mexico. Another thing is that the Mexican population is much bigger than the French one, so my guess is that much more people are voting too, and even though there is a sole ballot, that will still be a lot of ballots to give each single voters.
I disagree Isabelle. 28 candidate parties definitely fit into an A4 sheet of paper or even smaller (I just counted 26 names in the PSE voting ballot which is only half an A4 sheet). If you use two columns (14 party names or logos on each side) and arrange them in a practical manner you can definitely use a single ballot per voter.
In the case of the European Parliament elections, I understand that you are talking about candidate LISTS, meaning the entire list of the people that are running for EACH party, but if I understand it correctly and please correct me if I'm wrong, it all boils down to casting a vote for a PARTY which will then assign itself the proportional won seats to the people on their lists. What I'm trying to say is that I don't think people are going to the polls to vote specifically for Ms Milène Clichy, Formatrice en Fertilité, candidate number 16 of the Alliance Ecologiste Independante candidate list, but instead the voters are casting their vote for the Alliance Ecologiste Independante party, which will then proceed to give Ms Clichy a deputy seat if they indeed win enough votes towards to party in order to be entitled to 16 seats out of the 28 up for grabs. My point is, people are going to the polls to vote for the UMP, the MODEM, the PSOE, the FN, etc... and that's how their vote is going to be counted, so why is it absolutely necessary to write the entire party list on the ballot?... why not simply print out the lists in large poster size at the bureau of vote where people can review them if they wish (actually, I think this is already the case!)
I also can't understand why you say ticking a box would be difficult? Usually next to the box you see the logo of your party of choice, or the name of the candidate that's running so all you have to do is tick the box next to the name.
As for the German ballot, you can do a quick Google Image search and you'll find a pretty good amount of pics of what it looks like. I agree, at a first glance the thing looks mighty long and somewhat gibberishy but it's in German and I don't speak the language nor know the names of the candidates or parties, so I guess this is why it looks so spooky to me. However, if the same thing was done in French, I could easily find the name of the candidate or party I wanted to vote for on a page like that one and tick his her name, so once again, I don't find this system to be too complicated.
(continued below)....
And finally, to address the Mexican voting system. I guess I used the wrong term in my previous comment. I didn't mean to say that the mexican voting system was conceived to be greener, but the concept is greener. Even if the voting ballots aren't made of recycling paper (which I seriously doubt they are)... the fact of the matter is you only have ONE voting ballot per voter, in a ONE round election. This means that even if the entire population of Mexico votes (100 million people -and this is counting the children population) it still amounts to less paper than the French use in their elections. 36 million people cast a vote in the 1st round of the 2007 Presidential election, meaning each voter got 12 voting ballots -one for each party- = 452,4 million voting ballots. PLUS there was a second round where 35 million people voted (therefore using one of two ballots printed for them -Sarkozy vs Royal-), equaling 75 million additional voting ballots. So in total, 522,4 million voting ballots were printed in France the 2007 Presidential Election alone (and of course, the actual number is higher actually, because we should really be using the amount of people listed to vote which would add another 15% per cent).
And it's not only the amount of paper. It's the ink that is used, the transportation needed to deliver all these ballots and the unnecessary amount of cut down trees needed for them, because recycled or not recycled, only one twelfth of this amount is actually going to serve its purpose. I realize that a proportion of this is (let's hope) going to be put in the yellow bin and recycled by environment-conscious people, but you also know as well as I do that a very large proportion of these ballots are simply going to end up in trash bins across the country or discarded on the sidewalk (as I see is already the case in some parts of Paris).
What it comes down to is simply this: it's not because we have the resources (recycled or not recycled) that we're allowed to waste them, don't you think?
Innovation is about detecting an issue and trying to come up with a better solution.
Cheers,
Fned.
Hi Fned,
you wrote :
If you use two columns (14 party names or logos on each side) and arrange them in a practical manner you can definitely use a single ballot per voter.
It's not as easy as it seems. Each list has 26 names which is also the case for the municipal (mairie) elections.
I think that there are 32 lists for this european election, so 26 times 32 is a bit too much for a normal sheet of paper. Of course you may, as you suggest, just write the names of the parties (there are not only parties which stand for this election by the way) and provide the whole list on a board at the polling station. But then what about the people who vote by proxy? They will not come anywhere near a polling station and won't be able to read the names of the candidates. I know that you are going to reply that the names do not matter much. Well it's a principle in France that you know who you vote for. It's in the spirit of the constitution of 1958 that you don't vote for a party but for a person or a group of persons. If I am ready to vote for the list of party x, I might change my mind if I see among the names someone I strongly disapprove of. And this is often the case in municipal elections.
You mention the 525 million ballots used for the last presidential election. Do you realise that this enormous figure only amounts to 160,000 copies of a daily newspaper. And when you know that nearly 3 million copies are printed every day you might as well try to ban the reading of newspapers.
I would totally support you if the ballots were made with Amazon trees or even trees from our forests, but they are not. It's recycled paper, paper made with the wastes of saw-mills or with brush wood which would be useless otherwise.
One other point is that you also receive the leaflets of the parties. Do you also want to ban those? But then how will people who have no computer or no TV know what the parties say?
I really don't understand your point. The French ballot system may not be the best but it offers very little scope for fraud and is not an ecological scandal.
I think you should use your indignation and energy to struggle against the rubbish that we find everyday in our letter boxes, publicity stuff that nobody reads and that indeed you often find in the streets, instead of waging war against a democratic way of expressing oneself.
PS : I loved your photos from Jerusalem.
Of course, I can only agree with what Daniela wrote!
You don't like our way and I think that the Mexican way is easier to cheat than the French system...
Next step: the generalization of electronic voting machines, which are more and more used at every new election!!
I have to agree with you, Fned...this sounds pretty wasteful to me, even if ballots are made from recycled paper and then recycled again (the process of recycling itself uses resources as well). I'm from the US, and as has already been mentioned, our voting system got a pretty bad rap thanks to all those infamous hanging chads. But just because my country doesn't have the perfect system doesn't mean that I can't take a critical look at another country's system. It seems to me that you're doing the same - I didn't read you saying that Mexico's system is the example that France should follow, simply that the French system seems to waste paper! Even if the ballots couldn't be condensed into one sheet of paper, surely two or three sheets is better than the 10 plus that are necessary now.
To Isabelle and Daniela, in the US at least I don't think the correlation of Amazon rainforest to wasted paper is meant to be taken literally. The vast majority of wood and paper products in the world don't come from the rainforest, but it's still the high profile cause that's associated with wasting paper and is an easy buzzword to use to mean any kind of logging in general. I say that to put you at ease - I didn't for a second have an image of French election officials hiking into the wilds of Brazil to cut down endangered trees :)
I've thought long and hard on how to reply to Isabelle and Danièla's comments.
In my previous comments I tried to present arguments of why I think that the voting system in France could be improved and propose solutions of how this could be done, and in turn they've presented their arguments of why they don't think it needs improvement and why my suggestions wouldn't work.
I liked this exchange because although I'm not a militant (let me reassure you Danièla, I'm not "using up all my indignation an energy" on this issue any more so than by typing these lines) I am convinced that an interesting "brainstorming session" has just taken place here. If anything, I learned a few things and I hope my words also reached out to them on some level.
I finally came to the conclusion that no matter how much we go back and forth on this issue, we're not going to agree, at least not today.
But I also realized that at some point in time, not very long ago, someone must have said "hey! what if instead of using normal paper for the voting ballots in France, we instead use recycled paper from brush trees?" and a few years later here we are. So perhaps not too far out in the future someone will again come up with a great idea that will respond unanimously to both our points of view on this issue! In the meantime, I like the generalization of the electronic voting systems idea for instance!...
Donc en attendant, il ne me reste qu'à vous souhaiter un excellent fin de week-end mesdames!
Fned.
(y aun asi, que desperdicio de hojas, tinta, energia, etc!! digo, cabiendo todo en una hoja... porque se ahogan con tanto pinole!)[se me ocurre otra manera de decirlo pero es mucho mas prosaica y pelangocha jejej]
@Ale: I don't think that it's very elegant of you to write down what you have to say in Spanish just because you don't agree with us, the French!!!
Too bad for you that I learned Spanish for 9 years and therefore could understand what you wrote...
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