How are abstentions dealt with in votes in business meetings and group conscience meetings?
Groups are autonomous and can govern their business as they wish (Tradition IV). The following, however, is how most intergroups, most regions, and indeed the General Service Conference of Alcoholics Anonymous in Great Britain operate. Many groups follow this procedure, too. The main reason is maths, so hold onto your horses.
Concept XII suggests decisions are made by discussion, vote, and substantial unanimity. That means that the group discusses a possible change, votes to determine what people think, and makes changes only where the group can wholeheartedly sign up to the change. Two-thirds is conventional, but it's really desirable to have the group fall entirely or substantially behind a change. Changes should not be made lightly or without entire or substantial group backing. Discuss and incorporate minority ideas until there is a proposal that everyone is happy with.
How to hold a vote:
- Declare the group's established eligibility criteria. These should be written down as part of the group's procedures and circulated with minutes of meetings to avoid contention.
- Count eligible voters by raised hand.
- Establish a fifty per cent majority and a two-thirds majority. Fifty per cent is for procedural questions; two-thirds is for substantive questions.
- Read out the proposal.
- Get someone to second the proposal.
- Hold the vote (raised hands or written).
- Count the numbers of people voting 'yes', 'no', and 'abstain'.
- If you have two-thirds in favour of the proposal, the proposal is passed.
- If you do not, it is not.
- How the 'non-yeses' break down between 'no', 'abstain', and silence does not affect the outcome.
- Whatever the result, ask the minority if they wish to raise a concern.
- If they raise a concern, let them speak, then ask if anyone wants a revote because they've changed their mind.
- If anyone wants a revote, revote.
- If not, the original vote stands.
- This continues until the position has stabilised.
What this means is that abstentions count against the motion, along with 'nos' and anyone simply not voting. For instance:
- 30 eligible group members.
- 20 people vote 'yes'.
- 7 people vote 'no'.
- 2 people abstain.
- 1 person does not declare anything.
- Vote passed (20 / 30 = 2 / 3).
To put it simply, calculate the total number of eligible voters, calculate two-thirds, if two-thirds or more vote 'yes', the vote is passed. If not, it is not.
Why do we do this?
- The group should be substantially unanimous in favour of change. The 'nos' and 'abstainers' agree with each other in that they are not in favour of change.
- If abstainers were effectively deducted from the number of people eligible to vote, you could easily end up with this situation:
- 30 eligible group members.
- 14 people vote 'yes'.
- 6 vote 'no'.
- 10 abstain.
- Vote passed (14 / (14 + 6) = > 2 / 3).
- The group has voted for change.
- Yet only a minority of the eligible group members (14 / 30) are in favour of change.
So why do we have abstentions all?
- Ideally there should be no abstentions.
- There are valid reasons for abstention, however.
- If someone does not want to reveal their position, they might want to abstain, but, in that case, a written ballot should be held, so their voice is taken account of.
- If someone does not mind one way or another, they might abstain. In this case, it is quite right for the abstention to be grouped with 'no' for the purposes of the vote. They do not form part of the camp in favour of the motion, but they are eligible group members so are part of the body for the purposes of calculating what a majority is.
- If someone has a personal interest, they might abstain. This will be rare.
- If people simply don't know, there is probably scope for further discussion. If people need more time, give them more time.
- If people are abstaining, ask them why, and see if the reason can be eliminated, to get a clearer sense of group member views.
- If there are lots of abstainers, there's probably a problem with the proposal or scope for further discussion.
- Always make clear that abstaining does not take you out of the race.
- If a person wants to stay out of the decision-making of the group, rather than abstaining on a particular vote, the individual can refrain from putting up their hand when the group is calculating eligible members. This is called 'recusal'.
- Note that recusal takes you out of the decision-making process; abstention keeps you in it but keeps you on the fence.
- It is clear that the 'yes' voters and 'no' voters might have an interest in the abstainers remaining part of the total of eligible voters for the purposes of calculating a two-thirds majority, or alternatively being retroactively deducted from that number. However, if the abstainers are very concerned with how their votes are treated, they're potentially less neutral than the abstention might suggest. Here: tease out why the abstention happened, and see if it can be resolved. This is part of the process of fully discussing the matter at hand.
If the above is followed, proposals (which should be worded in favour of change) can be passed only with a majority of eligible group members in favour; proposals supported by only a minority cannot drive change by virtue of abstentions.
There is an exception to this: in a procedural vote (subject to a simple, fifty per cent majority) where an option must be picked, e.g. when to hold a particular extra business meeting, you have to exclude the abstentions. The maths easily shows you why:
- Shall we hold the business meeting on Monday or Tuesday?
- Monday: 4
- Tuesday: 4
- Abstentions: 2
- Simple majority: 5
- Result: decision blocked. Yet a decision must be made!
In this case, the abstentions must be resolved one way or another, or the abstainers must refrain from the entire procedure, and thus not be counted as part of the total. Let's say one backs out altogether and the other decides to decide, what happens?
- Monday: 5
- Tuesday: 4
- Abstentions: 0
- Simple majority: > 4.5
- Result: Monday.
Footnote
Under Robert's Rules: an abstention is a refusal to vote. Abstentions should not be called for or counted. There are two options for determining majorities: the total number of eligible voters or the total number of votes counted. The former option is what AA does; the latter option is also possible, and in fact groups could decide to do this. AA bodies (from groups downwards) do traditionally ask for and count abstentions, however, and, although this complicates matters, it does tease out what is 'really going on' with the abstainers, and this is all to the good.
Epilogue
To reiterate: groups can do what they want. The simplest way to explain to a group what has been decided is like this:
- 'In this group, a two-thirds majority of eligible voters must vote 'yes' for a proposal to pass.'
- 'In this group, a two-thirds majority of voting members must vote 'yes' for a proposal to pass.' [NB abstentions are not, in this model, votes cast but a refusal to vote.]
This sums it up in one line. In the first case, abstainers count towards the denominator; in the second, they do not.