Marcos Novaro: "Milei used a strategy to discourage moderates from voting."

Marcos Novaro is a political analyst, professor at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA), and researcher at CONICET (National Council of Statistics and Census). Speaking with Clarín , he discusses the causes of the low turnout in the legislative elections in the city of Buenos Aires, where record absenteeism was recorded and only 53.35% of the electorate voted.

-Why did so few people vote in the Buenos Aires elections?

There is a structural crisis, which continues and is protracted by Milei's election, with very little confidence in the institutional system, with many people expecting nothing from it and unwilling to play the game. In addition, there is the government's own strategy to discourage moderate sectors from voting, in a context of fragmentation and confusion that makes things worse.

What was the government's strategy to keep people from voting?

The government knows it's scaring away voters with this virulent tone it takes on public affairs. This is something these types of populist governments have done everywhere, where they know moderate voters don't vote. The climate is very favorable for the government because those who don't vote are the least politicized, least fanatic, whom the government doesn't want to vote. The strategy is very effective and achieves what it seeks: to keep them from voting. The government is interested in scaring away citizens and having the strongest faction. It's like the group of thugs that scares away the rest and remains center stage.

-In what other populist government does low voter turnout work this way?

In the United States, it's clearly like that. They do everything possible to prevent people from registering or voting. The fewer people who vote, the better for them. There, they put all kinds of obstacles in their way, so that as few people as possible vote. And they do it in the most explicit way possible. Here, it works the same way. It works for those with a highly motivated faction. It's the mouse-head strategy of 30%, because that saves them from having to negotiate to reach 50% of the vote. And they reach 50% when they go to a runoff and it's "us or inflation." It's the very explicit logic of Milei and his group. They're not trying to repair the distance with the political system. They want people to stay as far away from politics as possible.

-He also mentioned fragmentation as another cause of low participation.

-Of course, add to that the fragmentation in the city of Buenos Aires, where you have political forces that expel dissidents, who are losing some of their followers. And those groups don't care. Do you see why Santoro wanted to include Abal Medina? Karina Milei did the same with Marra. And the PRO party was more serious, in the political center, with the enormous clumsiness of the Macris, who thought they were going to exterminate Larreta. The fragmentation factor also greatly discourages voters. Most of the people who stayed home were non-Mileísta voters.

-How does the system work with these characteristics?

-It's a system that works well, for Milei, with low democratic legitimacy and a low level of protest, because people are confined to their homes and their problems. It's either submission or inflation. So, you submit. It's likely that there was less voting in places where there was a higher historical Peronist or Macri vote, while the most enthusiastic Milei supporters didn't abstain from voting. Those who lost the most votes are those who lost the election. This confirms that abstention suits Milei.

What can we expect for the upcoming national elections?

National elections always attract a little more voters. But we need to look at the electoral offerings, because if the dilemma is "inflation or submission," the low turnout could be repeated. That suits the government, but it leaves the people dissatisfied. Those who are enthusiastic about low inflation and Milei will go to vote; but for the one Santoro proposes, for the government to fall, or for those proposed by Kicillof and Cristina... It's understandable that many people will stay home, plus the fragmentation and structural distrust. One would like these people to reconsider and have a more inclusive offer and not 17 lists, but that's likely to happen. The Radical Party is more divided than the PRO. And the PRO has already thrown in the towel; in the province of Buenos Aires, they're going to give their all. And besides, if that happens in the province, what will happen at the national level? In terms of sequencing, the political center is in a bad position for what's coming next. The more moderate ones are those who haven't voted and won't feel drawn to this "submission or inflation" option. If one has to bet, things have already been shaped that way.

-Are we moving toward a voting level close to that of countries where voting is optional?

Yes, I think so. There probably aren't many differences with those countries and the United States. If you look at how it works in the United States, the scenario is very polarized, with very little variation, since the vote is very crystallized, with two subcultures, two separate worlds, who consume different media and engage in different activities. Argentina could resemble that, with low conflict, more governable, and a certain stability with that mouse-like head who can govern for a while. But the threat would be that low legitimacy, which could explode at some point, as in Chile, which is a very unequal society, which was very conflict-free, due to a stable system, but with low legitimacy, which ended up exploding. Perhaps that will happen to Milei, which functions economically, but tends toward authoritarianism and is more comparable to Chile than to the United States.

Could Milei form a coalition or will she prioritize going it alone with La Libertad Avanza?

I don't think Milei sees the possibility of forming a coalition, because he holds 30%. And he'll get 50% in a second round, because he'll have the chance to get that bonus for free, as he did in 2023. In a second round, that moderate vote can support him, so there's no inflation and this doesn't collapse, as Santoro proposes. That's more reasonable than a difficult negotiation with Macri. Furthermore, Milei doesn't believe power should be shared with anyone. It's not that fragmentation alone is enough, nor that Milei provokes it, but every little helps in a structural context where people aren't motivated to vote.

-How did the fact that the Buenos Aires legislative elections were disconnected from the national elections influence this?

-Perhaps fewer people will also vote in the national election if there's polarization with fragmentation of the rest. It's not simply the split, because this local election was attractive, there was a lot at stake, with attractive candidates, and there were reasons to vote. Why didn't people turn out? There are other reasons, because there was already a low willingness to vote. It's a broader phenomenon; the crisis continues. It's the same crisis we've been dragging on for some time now: people don't like the way things are, and they're not improving much. Why should I vote? If things aren't improving for me? This happens in all countries with low-intensity democracies.

-Has this been happening in recent years or is it something we're just seeing now?

Voter turnout rates have been declining for ten years, and they began to worsen since the end of Kirchnerism. It's a matter of timing. It has structural factors, which are difficult to correct, such as society's dissatisfaction with democracy. This happens everywhere, but in Argentina it's worse, because you have 17 parties in a local election. And those lists are fragments of other parties, whose sole function was to harass their former party colleagues, because they were left out of the game or excluded. For now, there's little solution, because this suits Milei; she takes advantage of the low voter turnout.