Protecting Elections Risk Management Resilience Building And Crisis Management In Elections

When elections go wrong, they can contribute to political crises that undermine democratic processes and institutions, trigger violent conflicts and instability, and harm governments’ domestic and international legitimacy. Therefore, calls to protect electoral integrity against manipulation from autocratic figures, malicious foreign interferences, negative impacts from natural hazards, and technical and human errors are ever increasing. The main objective of this Discussion Paper is to outline the importance of and avenues for an increased use of risk management, resilience-building and crisis management methods to protect electoral integrity.

Elections often have to be held in emergency situations. The Covid-19 pandemic was one of the most serious emergency situations that the world has seen. The rapid spread of the virus presented a huge humanitarian threat—but also an unparalleled challenge to electoral stakeholders globally seeking to protect electoral integrity during times of uncertainty. This volume identifies how the pandemic affected electoral integrity, what measures were put in place to protect elections and what worked in defending them. It brings together a comprehensive set of 26 country case studies to explore how elections were affected on the ground, what measures were put in place and what worked. These case studies are of elections which took place in the eye of the storm when practitioners and policymakers were operating under uncertainty and without the benefit of hindsight. To learn lessons in a more systematic way, this volume also provides a thematic analysis of electoral integrity during the pandemic using crossnational studies. This provides the big picture for policymakers, practitioners and academics looking back at the crisis. The volume therefore seeks to contribute towards the future development of policy and practice. However, it does so by using academic research methods and concepts which enable greater confidence in the policy lessons, as well as contributing directly to the scholarship on democracy, democratization and elections. The volume includes 11 areas of recommendation based on the evidence collected in this volume to protect electoral integrity in any future emergency situation.

When electoral risks are not understood and addressed, they can undermine the credibility of the process and the results it yields. Electoral management bodies (EMBs) encounter numerous risks across all phases of the electoral cycle. They operate in environments that are increasingly complex and volatile and where factors such as technology, demographics, insecurity, inaccurate or incomplete information and natural calamities, create increasing uncertainty. The experiences of EMBs show that when formal risk management processes are successfully implemented, the benefits are profound. Greater risk awareness helps organizations to focus their resources on where they are most needed, thus achieving cost-effectiveness. Over the last decade it has been observed that EMBs are increasingly moving from informal to formal risk management processes. The purpose of this Guide is to lay out a set of practical steps for EMBs on how to establish or advance their risk management framework. The Guide’s chapters reflect the breadth of key considerations in the implementation process and offer basic resources to assist in the process.

Crisis management has become a defining feature of contemporary governance. In this uniquely comprehensive analysis, the authors examine how leaders deal with the strategic challenges they face, the political risks and opportunities they encounter, the errors they make, the pitfalls they need to avoid, and the paths away from crisis they may pursue. This book is grounded in over a decade of collaborative, cross-national research, and offers an invaluable multidisciplinary perspective. This is an original and important contribution by experts in public policy and international security.

Information and communication technologies are increasingly prevalent in electoral management and democratic processes, even for countries without any form of electronic voting. These technologies offer numerous new opportunities, but also new threats. Cybersecurity is currently one of the greatest electoral challenges. It involves a broad range of actors, including electoral management bodies, cybersecurity expert bodies and security agencies. Many countries have found that interagency collaboration is essential for defending elections against digital threats. In recent years significant advances have been made in organizing such collaboration at the domestic and international levels. This guide tracks how countries are making progress on improving cybersecurity in elections. Based on an extensive collection of 20 case studies from all over the world, it provides lessons for those wanting to strengthen their defences against cyberattacks.

This Handbook was developed for electoral administrators and those involved in reforming EMBs. It provides comparative experience of and best practices on EMB structures and funding models, as well as means for evaluating performance. A range of case studies illustrate examples from specific contexts in Afghanistan, Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cambodia, Costa Rica, Haiti, India, Kenya, the Republic of Korea, Liberia, Mexico, Nigeria, Norway, Senegal, Republic of Seychelles, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Tunisia, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and the United States. This new and revised edition of the 2006 International IDEA Handbook includes updated country-level data and case studies and significantly expanded sections on the role of gender, professional development and technology in elections.

Electronic voting is often seen as a tool for making the electoral process more efficient and for increasing trust in its management. Properly implemented, e-voting solutions can increase the security of the ballot, speed up the processing of results and make voting easier. However, the challenges are considerable. If not carefully planned and designed, e-voting can undermine the confidence in the whole electoral process. Technology upgrades in elections are always challenging projects that require careful deliberation and planning. Introducing e-voting is probably the most difficult upgrade as this technology touches the core of the entire electoral process—the casting and counting of the votes. E-voting greatly reduces direct human control and influence in this process. This provides an opportunity for solving some old electoral problems, but also introduces a whole range of new concerns. Consequently, e-voting usually triggers more criticism and opposition and is more disputed than any other information technology application in elections. This Policy Paper outlines contextual factors that can influence the success of e-voting solutions and highlights the importance of considering these factors before choosing to introduce new voting technologies.