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Frank FurediSociologist, commentator and author of Culture of Fear, Where Have All The Intellectuals Gone?, Paranoid Parenting, Therapy Culture, and On Tolerance: In Defence of Moral Independence. |
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| We want to vote, but… On my way to the polling station, I kept running into people I recognised through everyday encounters in our small town. We didn’t know very much about each other, and even less about each other’s politics, but we all shared a common predicament: we felt that there was nobody we could positively vote for. Over the past week, most of my arguments have been about which party it is necessary to keep out rather than which one to endorse. And yet, almost everyone I talked to was keen to get stuck in and to cast his or her vote. People understood that they mustn’t waste a rare opportunity to make their voice heard, but sadly they also felt that, despite their best intentions, their vote was likely to be wasted. What this election showed me is that there is a real appetite for public engagement; millions of people want to be thought of as responsible citizens. It is important that this potential is harnessed towards a positive purpose. For better or worse, political life is more open and fluid than at any time in recent decades. And I for one think that this is a good time to get stuck in and to ensure that there is a substantial group of open-minded, liberal-thinking upholders of individual autonomy and freedom, of future-oriented people running for office in the next election. Watch this space! First published by spiked, 7 May 2010 |
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