Should Only Informed Citizens Get to Vote?
Most Americans can't name their representative or all three branches of government. Mill proposed weighted voting in 1861. Does democracy require an informed electorate — or is any competence gate a door to authoritarianism? Two debaters, opposing sides — you score who makes the stronger case.
Monday, September 21, 2026 · 7:00 PM EDT
What's at stake
Whoever defines 'competence' controls who votes. But accepting that policy is shaped by voters who don't understand its consequences is also a choice with real costs.
The Matchup
The Positions
Democracy asks us to treat all votes as equal regardless of the information behind them; epistocracy asks whether that is actually fair to people who study the issues.
- Voters are systematically ignorant of basic political facts — most can't name their representative, the three branches of government, or basic party policies; collective decisions made on this basis are not the wisdom of crowds but its opposite.
- Competence conditions already exist: we require a driver's license to drive, a bar exam to practice law, a medical license to prescribe drugs; it's not obvious why the most consequential collective decision — government — should be the one with no competence requirement.
- Giving more weight to informed votes doesn't necessarily mean removing rights from the ignorant; weighted voting, citizens' assemblies, and deliberative mini-publics are epistocratic reforms that improve decision quality without disenfranchisement.
Debater: To be announced
The moment you let someone decide who is 'informed enough' to vote, you've handed democracy's levers to whoever defines the test — a power that will always be abused.
- Every historical literacy test was a tool of racial and class oppression — the US's history of literacy requirements shows exactly who gets labeled 'uninformed': Black voters, immigrants, the poor; this proposal has a body count.
- Democracy's point is not to produce optimal policy outputs but to ensure that everyone affected by power has a say in it; legitimacy and competence are different values, and legitimacy is what democracy exists to provide.
- Who writes the test? Every epistocratic system hands extraordinary power to whoever defines 'political knowledge' — and that knowledge will inevitably be the knowledge of the class that writes it.
Debater: To be announced
Join the debate
Make Your Case
Record a 60-second video on either side — or make it in writing. The strongest cases get featured before the live debate.
“Voters are systematically ignorant of basic political facts. Most cannot name their representative, identify the three branches of government, or describe their own party's policies. Collective decisions made on this basis are not the wisdom of crowds — they are aggregated ignorance, producing outcomes nobody wants and nobody can explain.”
“Competence conditions already exist for consequential decisions: a driver's license to drive, a bar exam to practice law, a medical license to prescribe drugs. It is not obvious why government — the most consequential collective decision we make — should be the one domain with no competence requirement whatsoever.”
“Every historical literacy test was a tool of racial and class oppression. The US's history of literacy requirements shows exactly who gets labeled 'uninformed': Black voters, immigrants, the poor. This proposal has a body count, and the populations most likely to fail any knowledge test are the ones most dependent on government to protect their interests.”
“Democracy's point is not to produce optimal policy outputs but to ensure that everyone affected by power has a say in it. Legitimacy and competence are different values, and legitimacy is what democracy exists to provide. A technically optimal decision made by an expert class over the objection of the governed is not better governance — it is benevolent autocracy.”
How It Works
The Format
Standard SuperDebate: two people, cross-examination, moderated from start to finish
Opening Argument
PRO · opening case
Cross-Examination
CON questions PRO
Opening Argument
CON · opening case
Cross-Examination
PRO questions CON
Rebuttal
PRO
Rebuttal
CON
Closing Statement
PRO · final case
Closing Statement
CON · final case
Audience Vote
You pick the winner
~28 minutes of debate · audience vote follows closing statements
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Monday, September 21, 2026 · 7:00 PM EDT
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