Elections

Спроби впливу на виборчі процеси шляхом застосування кібератак набувають все більшого поширення у світі – такі кіберінциденти фокусуються, передусім, на слабких сторонах виборчої інфраструктури . З огляду на зростання кількості кіберінцидентів ЄС  та США  почали розробку керівництв щодо практичних кроків, спрямованих на покращення системи кібербезпеки виборів. Заразом все більша кількість держав шукає власні підходи, які б не лише дозволили ефективно реагувати на кібератаки під час виборчого процесу, але й максимально їх попереджувати.
Фахівці у галузі кібербезпеки, вважають, що в сучасних умовах кіберскладові виборчого процесу (у тому числі машини для голосування, програмне забезпечення тощо) повинні розглядатися як критична інфраструктура держави.

This edition has been dedicated to Democracy, Corruption and Development in Africa. It addresses the following issues:
a)  Democracy: Are regular elections enough?  Do election observer missions matter?
b) How can Africa strengthen its democracy and achieve development?
c)  How are data used and abused to manipulate election results?
d) Does corruption reduce chances of a sitting president or party n power being reelected?
e) How have governance institutions failed or slowed down African development?
f) How can aid help Africa to develop?
g) What role should  mass media, community media, social media and formal education play to catalyze African democracy and development?

The purpose of this article is to highlight the clientelistic strategies and informal practices that the ruling political parties in Albania use during the elections to ensure an unfair advantage in their favour over the opposition challengers One of the main characteristics of the political developments of the transition period in Albania since 1991 has been the flourishing of informal practices and clientelist networks of political parties within state structures, which has produced an extreme politicization of these

Dewasa ini sangat sedikit kelompok atau negara yang menolak gagasan demokrasi. Diskusi tentang demokrasi selalu berasosiasi dengan bahasan pemilu. Hal itu karena pemilu merupakan salah satu bagian dari prosedur demokrasi. Pemilu juga telah menjelma menjadi suatu indikator sebuah negara yang demokratis. Negara-negara non-demokratis sekalipun, menyelenggarakan pemilu sebagai respon atas perubahan zaman, dan biasanya untuk mengisi posisi-posisi politik tertentu.

Exit Polls‘ rest on unstable constitutional tectonic plates eager to erupt without notice. It has equal and opposite forces, pulling at it, as its proponent as well as opponent lie in the Constitution. Conduct of free and fair elections has been the focus of the Election Commission from its conception, but fulfilling its constitutional function reached a roadblock when the Apex Court held that it was overreaching its powers. Hence, the Parliament cleverly took over, and amended the Representation of People‘s Act, 1951 to add Section.126A. The section imposes a complete ban on exit polls and makes it impossible to legitimately collect any data through the same. Exit polls reveal some unique information which may aide in the casting of an informed vote. An informed voter is a necessary pre-condition for a robust democracy, functioning of the principle of free and fair elections and thus to uphold the basic structure of our Constitution, exit polls or any other method of information extraction or dissemination is necessary.

Besides the above a complete ban on exit polls may well be challenged under Art. 19(1)(a); though, whether this freedom functions dually for the media as well as the citizen, shall be considered. Further, the paper analyses whether exit polls can be legally or logically read into any of the restrictions under 19(2) without 'statutise-ing' the Constitution, a document which lays down basic principles and not nuanced modalities. A modest effort has been made in this behalf to compare the forms of fundamental rights that may be used to protect exit polls, in India as well as America. The same, it is noted, is a reflection of the kind of freedom the press is guaranteed by their respective Grundnorms.

"For decades now, democratic deficit has plagued the entire political fabric of Canada. National studies have shown that civic engagement — that includes voting in elections and other forms of political participation has declined and continue to decline over the past two decades. This trend does not bode well for the long-term health of Canadian democracy. Declining participation means fewer opportunities for federal and provincial governments to understand the needs and concerns of their constituents. The problem is even more precarious in Canada’s southernmost provinces, of which Saskatchewan is no exception.
Moreover, lack of civic participation can contribute to disparities in citizen influence over legislation — whether it is through elected representatives or the enterprise procedure. Such a trend could be jeopardizing to the province’s democratic future. This paper asks what are the notable factors influencing voter turnouts in Saskatchewan. To address this fundamental question, this paper seeks to look at these lower levels of voter turnouts in Saskatchewan by using the data gathered from the comparative provincial election survey of 2011.
This paper uses the independent variables age, educational level and gender to test the dependent variable — the likelihood to vote or not.  This paper also looks at which of the three independent variables makes a solid case as a predictor of one’s likelihood to vote or otherwise in Saskatchewan provincial elections.

Keywords: Democratic Deficit; Elections; Comparative Provincial Election Survey; Saskatchewan

Word Count: 248"

Endorsements by retired flag and general officers are now a fixture of the presidential election cycle. However, their motivations are unclear. Retired flag officers might endorse with material, purposive, or solidarity motives. We evaluate these motivations with a new data set of 1,340 endorsements by 1,041 endorsers between 2004 and 2016 matched with campaign contributions. We find that campaign contributions, service in the Navy, and retiring as a higher ranked officer are all associated with an increased likelihood of endorsing. We conclude that about 10 retired flag officers participate to improve their material situation, 193 seek to advance their ideological preferences, and the remainder participate to demonstrate solidarity with their peers or acquaintances. These findings provide new insight into endorser motivations and civil-military relations.

Texto para o Boletim Opsa, de 2013, sobre as eleições seguintes para presidente e para prefeito de Montevidéu. O arquivo está sem a formatação com que foi publicado; o upload foi feito agora porque o acervo do OPSA está fora do ar.

Início do texto (não um resumo):
As eleições são quase semanalmente tema central do noticiário político no Uruguai, apesar de o sucessor de José "Pepe" Mujica na Presidência da República só ser escolhido em 10/2014 e de o pleito para a Prefeitura Municipal de Montevidéu, a capital, onde vive 1,3 milhão dos 3,3 milhões de uruguaios, ser realizado apenas em 05/2015 (juntamente com as demais eleições departamentais). A Frente Ampla é favorita segundo todas as pesquisas nas duas disputas, tendendo, portanto, a permanecer por mais um mandato nos dois cargos executivos eletivos mais relevantes do país. Desde que a coalizão de esquerda Frente Ampla, fundada em 1971, venceu as eleições municipais de Montevidéu em 1990 com o jovem Tabaré Vázquez como candidato, dando fim à supremacia do Partido Colorado na capital, a política uruguaia começou a se modificar. A Frente Ampla gradativamente foi ampliando suas votações nacionais, ao mesmo tempo em que não mais perdeu o controle de Montevidéu. Aquele mesmo Tabaré Vázquez consolidou-se como líder da coalizão e como seu candidato natural à Presidência, e obteve resultados cada vez melhores: terceira colocação em um quase empate tríplice em 1994, vitória no primeiro turno com derrota no segundo em 1999, e eleição já no primeiro turno com maioria absoluta dos votos em 2004. O fato de as eleições presidenciais e parlamentares serem atreladas, sem se poder votar em partidos diferentes em cada uma delas, significa que a Frente Ampla tem a maior bancada no Congresso desde 1999, e que tem a maioria das cadeiras legislativas desde a vitória de Vázquez. Acabou o bipartidarismo em que, desde o início da própria existência do Uruguai como país, dois partidos tradicionais, o Nacional e o Colorado, disputavam o poder. Passou a haver dois blocos, o de esquerda-hegemonizado pela Frente Ampla-e o de direita-em que os dois partidos históricos, com os programas mais próximos do que nunca, sempre se aliam em eventual segundo turno. 1 Foi justamente o que ocorreu quando Mujica se candidatou à sucessão de Vázquez em 2009: passado o primeiro turno, o candidato blanco e ex-presidente Luis Alberto Lacalle teve o apoio do colorado Pedro Bordaberry, mas mesmo assim saiu derrotado e a Frente Ampla permaneceu no poder. Em Montevidéu, depois de Vázquez foram eleitos para a Prefeitura ainda outros três candidatos da Frente Ampla, estando no cargo atualmente Ana Olivera, que pertence ao Partido Comunista, um dos setores fundadores da coalizão. Para tentar romper com essa supremacia da esquerda, blancos e colorados chegaram a um acordo histórico: criar um partido exclusivamente para concorrerem juntos contra a candidatura frente-amplista 2. Assim, formou-se o Partido da Concertação, que lançará três candidatos simultaneamente. Os votos dos três serão somados e, caso superem juntos a votação do nome a ser indicado pela Frente Ampla, conseguirão derrotá-la. Na hipótese de isso ocorrer, aquele entre os três candidatos do Partido da Concertação que for mais votado, mesmo que menos do que o concorrente da esquerda, será o novo prefeito.

How does a change from a compulsory voting system to a voluntary one affect election turnout? It is often argued that an electoral regime under which voting is voluntary reproduces class bias or, in other words, that the rich vote more than the poor. This bias is corrected either by the introduction of compulsory voting or the existence of strong left-wing parties and trade unions able to mobilize poorer segments of the population. In this article, we put forward an alternative argument. We assert that when voting is voluntary, class bias can disappear if an election is very competitive since this affects both turnout and its socio-economic composition. To evaluate this argument, we examine the case of Chile’s 2012 municipal election when voting was voluntary for the first time, instead of compulsory.

This blog post examines the promise of a new road in an Ulaanbaatar ger district. It argues that the notion of voter 'choice' in Mongolia is complicated by three factors: 1. the disconnection of political ideology from the major political parties, 2. the forces at work that influence voting through semi-and non-legal means, and 3. a phenomenon I will call " the inverted logic of the vote-return exchange ".

Si bien las campañas electorales empiezan a profesionalizarse en Colombia, muchas son las que, todavía, están hechas a punta de improvisación y sin verdadera planeación. Se resumen aquí los diez errores que no puede cometer un candidato en campaña

These are the slides I used at an online webinar MIDYA-LEKSYON:
An Online Lecture with the View towards the Influence and Roles of Media in Election Period on April 13, 2021 organized by the Bachelor of Arts in Communication 2nd year students of the University of Caloocan City-South Campus.

This research paper explores some of the criteria set for elections and the conditions in which the respondents participate. Moreover, the voters’mindset was investigated by drawing the illustrations from newspapers, television, religious, social and particular political condition in the midst of elections as well as its impact on their voting behavior.The study consisted of male and female groups of registered voters, who belonged to urban and rural (sub-urban) areas of Taxila and Wah Cantt, the two major cities of Punjab that make significant difference in the final results of the elections. Our test group consisted of 600 respondents from the area, 383 male voters and 217 female voters. The study proved the variables to be highly significant in light of the demographics. The findings revealed casting of votes was not mostly by the free will of respondents, rather it was imposed by the structure of the society by providing a strict guidelines for voting criteria. The political beh...

European voters can be classified into different groups according to the Political Group of the European Parliament the MEP they have voted for is attached to. In the first part of the paper we build clusters of EU countries according to the distribution of the country MEPs to the Political Groups. We find two large clusters of memberstates. One of the two large clusters includes countries from the central and northern Europe and the other cluster includes countries from southern Europe. In the second part of the paper we study the social characteristics of the voters in each political group. Using a series of socio-structural variables, (i.e. subjective social class, education level, standard of living, and religiosity), from the PIREDEU voter survey data, we try to describe the social profile of the voters in each group. Then we study the social profiles of the voters in each group in these two large clusters of EU countries. There are political groups that display strong associat...

Los movimientos #YoSoy132 en México y #EleNão en Brasil, son expresivos de sociedades que rechazan el abuso mediático vía internet-específicamente en las redes sociales- tal y como se ha hecho históricamente desde la televisión, la radio y la prensa escrita. Es en este contexto cuando los bots y las fake news adquieren sentido, puesto que el control monopólico de los medios tradicionales de comunicación queda rebasado frente al poder expansivo del internet entre los espacios de información masiva.

In Brasilien spielt der Prozess des Nation-Buildings eine zentrale Rolle. Von der 'Rassendemokratie' über das 'Land der Zukunft' bis zum 'Land für Alle'-die Bemühungen das riesige Land mit seiner sehr heterogenen Bevölkerung zu vereinen, fanden unter den verschiedensten, symbolisch aufgeladenen Parolen statt. Diese Konzepte prägen Brasiliens nationale Identität bis heute und bestimmen oft die Wahrnehmung der großen sozio-ökonomischen Differenzen im Land. Im Oktober 2018 wurde, nach einer lang anhaltenden wirtschaftlichen und politischen Krise sowie einem rücksichtslosen Präsidentschaftswahlkampf, mit Jair Bolsonaro ein rechtsextremer Populist zum neuen Präsidenten Brasiliens gewählt. Unter dem Motto ‚Brasilien über alles, Gott über allen' versprach er in Zukunft für die Mehrheit der Brasilianer*innen zu regieren und nicht für die Minderheiten, wie es bis jetzt der Fall gewesen sei. Dabei werden unterschiedliche Gruppen, wie LGTB-Aktivist*innen, Feminist*innen und Sozialist*innen, immer wieder explizit in das Zentrum seiner Kritik gestellt. Diese müssten sich von nun an entweder der Mehrheit beugen oder sie würden aus dem Land verschwinden. In der Präsentation wird dieses rechtspopulistische Nation-Building anhand von Reden, Werbespots und Infomaterial aus dem Präsidentschaftswahlkampf analysiert. Das Material wird dabei auf seine Ausschlüsse, Grenzziehungen und diskursiven Bezüge hin untersucht, sodass ein Bild der von Bolsonaro angestrebten Gesellschaftsordnung entsteht. Dabei wird auch immer wieder auf Differenzen und Gemeinsamkeiten zu rechten populistischen Bewegungen in Europa und den USA hingewiesen. Dies erlaubt ein differenzierteres Bild des globalen Rechtspopulismus zu zeichnen, die Entwicklungen in Brasilien auch in transnationale Zusammenhänge einzuordnen und eurozentristische Annahmen zu hinterfragen.

Since the kick-off in 2015 of the last presidential campaign, a climate of fear and intimidation has dominated national life in the United States to a degree rarely seen before, poisoning our politics and reaching into our very relationships with friends, co-workers, and neighbors.
    Confronting Political Intimidation is about how this came to be, how we can see ourselves through it, but also why it is not likely to go away anytime soon.
      At the core of this political history is a larger U.S. public culture of intimidation and bullying in the workplace, media, and political arena that has been building for 30 years. It is not by chance that in 2017 the U.S. inaugurated Donald Trump, an openly authoritarian president who is an abusive CEO, capitalist folk hero, and Internet troll.
    The current harsh environment is a direct challenge to citizens and residents, especially those seeking to engage in progressive activism and party politics now and in the years to come.
      This short book offers a unique guide to the strategies and dynamics of contemporary political intimidation and public bullying: the dangers they present, the snares and traps that envelop their targets, and the lessons to be learned.
      In the end, it’s about shedding light on the dark side of contemporary national life in order to see beyond it.

Net sales proceeds will go to Indviisible National of IndivisbleGuide,com.

Initiatives to change or sidestep presidential term limits are often presented as a response to popular demand, yet tend to be deeply polarizing and may even lead to violence. Opinion on the legality of changing term limits tends to be sharply divided not only in the country concerned but also among the international community. In an effort to fine-tune policy debate, this paper looks at the normative framework relating to term limits and their removal. It recommends that, in the absence of clear international norms, the issue be approached as a matter of maintaining confidence in a country’s electoral process and political system. This means focusing on the process by which term limits might be amended or interpreted.

Öz: Bu çalışma, dünya ölçeğinde işgücü piyasası düzenleme aracı olarak yaygın biçimde uygulanan asgari ücretin seçimlerle olan ilişkisine odaklanmaktadır. İşçi-işveren-devlet temsilcilerinden oluşan üçlü bir komisyon ile belirlenen asgari ücret seviyeleri göz önüne alınarak, Türkiye'de seçim dönemlerinin asgari ücret üzerinde ne tür bir etki yaptığı so-rusu ekonometrik olarak test edilmiştir. Çalışmanın kuramsal çerçevesini politik iş çevri-mi literatürü oluşturmaktadır. 1975-2019 yılları arasında reel asgari ücret değişimlerinin belirleyenleri regresyon analizine tabi tutulmuş ve elde edilen bulgular ışığında, seçim dönemlerinin reel asgari ücret artışlarında istatistiki olarak anlamlı bir etmen olduğu ileri sürülmüştür. Abstract: This study focuses on the relationship between minimum wage, which is a widely used labor market regulation across the world, and elections. Taking into consideration the minimum wage levels set by a tripartite commission, including workers',employers' and government's representatives, an econometric analysis is conducted to find out the impacts of the election periods on the minimum wage in Turkey. The theoretical framework of the study relies on the political business cycle literature. The determinants of real minimum wage changes between 1975 and 2019 are subjected to regression analysis. The findings suggest that election periods in Turkey is a statistically significant factor for real minimum wage increases.

Peru, in contrast to neighbouring Bolivia and Ecuador, has neither an important indigenous party nor a strong indigenous movement. Nevertheless, in recent years a growing gap has emerged in the voting patterns of indigenous and non-indigenous areas. This article maintains that this gap has developed because some Peruvian politicians, including Alberto Fujimori, Alejandro Toledo and Ollanta Humala, successfully wooed indigenous voters with a combination of ethnic and populist appeals. Like traditional populist leaders, they denounced the political elites, focused their campaigns on the poor and presented themselves as the saviours of Peru, but also forged ties to indigenous leaders, invoked indigenous symbols and embraced some ethnic demands. Although neither Fujimori, nor Toledo, nor Humala self-identified as indigenous, they successfully presented themselves as more ethnically proximate to the indigenous population than their main competitors, who represented the white Lima elite.

The issue of intervention of the judiciary on the activities of political parties in Nigeria has sparked much controversy in recent years. The topic of this paper ‘Judicial intervention on the activities Of Political Parties in Nigeria: The contending perspectives’ is quite apt, considering the fact that Nigeria is set to hold another round of general elections in 2019. The controversy always leading to the invitation of court in these regard is usually attributed to the fallout from elections/tenure of party executives, nomination/sponsorship of candidates and suspension/expulsion of the membership status of some actors of the political parties. Political parties are generally considered to be voluntary associations. Being voluntary associations, they are deemed supreme over their affairs. The conduct of such affairs is not usually subject to the jurisdiction of the court. But it does seem that there are instances where the conduct of political parties becomes amenable to judicial supervision. The courts have not succeeded in clearly delineating such circumstances if at all they exist.
This paper therefore sets out to examine the organizational autonomy of political parties with a view to ascertain whether the courts in practical terms exercise any jurisdiction over political parties. This is best determined by the amenability of political parties to judicial decisions affecting them.

Nigeria’s democracy is under threat following growing trend of vote buying and selling in elections. Capacity, competence and character are not parameters for assessing electoral candidates. Cash-for-vote or ‘see and buy’ is emerging as the major determinant of electoral choice. Besides being illegal as explicitly stated in Nigeria’s electoral laws, vote buying also has a tendency to aggravate corruption in public offices as those who hold public mandates are made to seek corrupt means of enriching themselves towards future elections. This menace is undermining electoral choices and could imperil Nigeria’s democracy if not abated.
Vote buying is gradually replacing anti-polls or rigging tactics of politicians. This is attributed to checks and balances in the electoral process that has made electoral brigandage unattractive to politicians. Vote buying is the latest strategy adopted by politicians undermine the electoral process. This was evident in the July 14 governorship election in Ekiti state where politicians deployed multiple tactics to buy votes at the polling stations.

In the final analysis, the study contends that resolving the issue and reversing the trend may involve general economic empowerment of voters (citizens), far more than and beyond casual tinkering with modalities of voting and improving balloting secrecy by the authorities. It will take good governance, legal enforcement, prioritisation of employment generation, restoration of ideological base for political parties, holistic war on corruption, and effective poverty reduction as policy options towards reversing and remedying the ugly trend.

In this blog-essay in Huffington Post, I argue that for all their differences, the candidates in the presidential election on every side -- from Donald Trump or Jeb Bush to Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders -- agree that democracy involves, first and foremost, elections. Citizens most important role is as voter.

There is another concept of democracy deep in American history that I experienced first hand in the civil rights movement -- citizens as co-creators (and thus co-owners) of democracy. We  need debates over the coming election season about "who owns the story?"

The Russian interference in the presidential elections in the United States and in France raises questions about the need and ability of democratic countries to protect their election processes. This article indicates the importance of relating to elections in a democratic country as both critical infrastructure and as a critical process, and it presents the threats to elections posed by both cyber and cultural developments. This article addresses the reality in which the extensive use of social networks and direct communications channels enables foreign entities to significantly influence the democratic process—without crippling the voting systems—by introducing outside influence into the political discourse. This constitutes a new challenge to democratic countries, which warrants thinking and re-organization.

This article presents the findings of perceptions of electoral integrity survey for subnational elections in India between 2015 and 2017. The perceptions of electoral integrity survey is an attempt to provide a comprehensive, impartial and independent source of information derived from experts about elections conforming to internationally recognized principles and standards. The article then evaluates the factors that account for differences in the perceptions of electoral integrity in India. We show that higher-income states in India tend to have higher levels of electoral integrity. However, we argue that differences in the quality of governance best explain subnational variation in the perceptions of electoral integrity in India.

Media is one of the most important tools for transferring political discourse to society. In this context, especially during the election periods, the news with an intense political discourse constitutes the agenda. The fiction of these news is structured in the axis of the media and politics relationship of the period. The purpose of this study is to reveal the relationship between media and politics and the reflection of political discourse on the news about the 31 March Local Elections. In the study, in which the discourse analysis method was used, the news shared by the newspapers Sabah, Yeni Şafak, Hürriyet and BirGün, selected as a sample of the study, on 30-31 March and 1 April were analyzed. As a result of the study, it was seen that the news texts lacked semantic richness and were constructed with a one-dimensional perspective. Newspapers have adopted an editorial policy that manipulates the process of political information by putting general political discourse ahead of local political discourses. In addition, in the analyzes, it has been determined that the polarizing approach of politicians is reflected in the news in a partisan manner.