Domestic Election Research Articles

Citizenship and Political Participation: The Role of Electoral Rights Under European Union Law

As a contribution to a collection focusing on immigration in Ireland, this paper provides the broader EU political and legal context to issues of political participation of non-citizens in domestic elections. The paper surveys both the EU electoral rights themselves, under the EU Treaties, and also the intersection between these rights and national political practices which grant, or deny, political participation rights to all migrants, regardless of whether they are EU citizens or third country nationals.

European Parliament Elections 2014: Europe's Fateful Choices; EJIL and ESIL; In this Issue

After many ostrich years the European head is out of the sand: there really is a problem with the legitimacy - or rather, the perception of legitimacy - of the European construct. It is not a mere bee in the bonnet of some irritating academics disconnected from reality. Eurobarometer indications are at their lowest and the results of a highly respected Pew Center survey, too, show a remarkable fall in support for Europe among its citizens. Political differences on how to tackle the Euro crisis are, worryingly, both reflective and constitutive of what one may call a solidarity deficit. Even if the EU manages to make substantive and substantial strides in the construction of the much vaunted Banking Union after the German domestic elections in the autumn, it is not expected that any of the above will change significantly.

Three models of democracy, political community and representation in the EU

The EU's political system represents European citizens via three different channels: through the European Parliament; indirectly through their governments in the Council; and through domestic elections, which hold these last democratically accountable to national parliaments or citizens. However, these channels involve different and incompatible types of representation and forms of democracy, reflecting divergent conceptions of political community which, following Philip Pettit, we term solidarism, singularism and civicity respectively. The first channel seeks to represent the common good of a European people; the second the mutual self-interest of the single member states. We argue the first lacks social and political legitimacy, while the second proves insufficient to tackle collective European problems equitably or effectively. We propose reinforcing the third channel so as to modify these other two and produce a European ‘demoi-cracy’ able to sustain the form of representative democracy we associate with a civicity. We contend such a system fosters an ‘ever closer Union among the peoples of Europe’ by allowing the construction of shared policies that treat the different demoi with equal concern and respect.

The Democratic Foundations of Policy Diffusion: An Introduction

Why do law reforms spread around the world in waves? In the dominant account of diffusion through technocracy, international networks of elites develop orthodox policy solutions and transplant these across countries without regard for the wishes of ordinary citizens. But this account overlooks a critical factor: in democracies, reforms must win the support of politicians, voters, and interest groups. This book claims that laws spread across countries in very public and politicized ways, and develops a theory of diffusion through democracy. I argue that politicians choose to follow certain international models to win domestic elections, and to persuade skeptical voters that their ideas are not radical, ill-thought-out experiments, but mainstream, tried-and-true solutions. This book shows how international models generated domestic support for health, family, and employment law reforms across rich democracies. Information that international organizations have endorsed certain reforms or that foreign countries have adopted them is valuable to voters. Public opinion experiments show that even Americans respond positively to this information. Case studies of election campaigns and legislative debates demonstrate that politicians with diverse ideologies reference international models strategically, and focus on the few international organizations and countries familiar to voters. Data on policy adoption from many rich democracies document that governments follow international organization templates and imitate the policy choices of countries heavily covered in national media and familiar to voters. The book provides a direct defense to a major criticism international organizations and networks face: that they conflict with domestic democracy. The book also explains how to design international institutions and transnational advocacy campaigns to spread laws more effectively. The introductory chapter follows.

Making Voters Count: Evidence from Field Experiments about the Efficacy of Domestic Election Observation

Elections are important because they hold the promise of empowering voters to hold leaders accountable. The sad reality, however, is that voters in less than democratic states often are marginalized because of widespread election fraud. Field experiments in three different countries are here used to show that high-quality civil society ob- servers can reduce fraud on election day. The results also confirm that all regimes are not equally sensitive to such interventions. For the first time new fraud forensics techniques are used to examine observer effects. I argue that a reduction in detectable fraud forces authorities to engage with the electorate more directly, instead of focusing their efforts on bureaucratically manipulating the outcome. It is suggested that when faced with monitoring, autocrats substitute election fraud with other forms of manipulation, in the form of vote buying and intimidation. This in itself constitutes a perverse form of empowerment of voters, perverse since the process continues to be both un-free and unfair.

Facebook’s Boundaries

Facebook was established to help students keep in touch after graduation, but now it’s being credited with major roles in everything from domestic elections to international uprisings. In its no-longer-insular world, Facebook transforms the private into the public.

Domestic Elections and Distributional Bargaining in the European Union

This paper analyzes electoral cycles in distributional bargaining in the European Union. I argue that governments attempt to increase their EU membership benefits above average levels in the pre-election period hoping to appear politically competent to their voters. The theory discusses when and how EU members can increase these gains before elections through negotiations in the Council of Ministers. A time-series cross sectional analysis of EU member states' annual budget negotiations from 1977-2006 supports the existence of electoral cycles in distributional bargaining and generally points to the importance of accounting for such cycles when analyzing patterns of international cooperation.

The political economy of IMF forecasts

We investigate the political economy of IMF forecasts with data for 157 countries (1999–2005). Generally, we find evidence of forecast bias in growth and inflation. Specifically, we find that countries voting with the United States in the UN General Assembly receive lower inflation forecasts as domestic elections approach. Countries with large loans outstanding from the IMF also receive lower inflation forecasts, suggesting that the IMF engages in “defensive forecasting.” Finally, countries with fixed exchange rate regimes receive lower inflation forecasts, suggesting the IMF desires to preserve stability as inflation can have detrimental effects under such an exchange rate regime.

The Observer Effect in International Politics: Evidence from a Natural Experiment

By pressuring governments to hold democratic elections and by becoming directly involved in the electoral process through technical assistance and funding or as election monitors, international actors now play a visible role in domestic elections and other democratic processes throughout the developing world. Although scholars have documented several macrolevel relationships between international-level variables and movement toward democracy, there has been little attention paid to the microlevel effects of international involvement in the democratization process. This article examines the effects of international election observation as a prominent form of international involvement in domestic elections and exploits a natural experiment in order to test whether international observers reduce election fraud. Using data from the 2003 presidential elections in Armenia, the article demonstrates that although observers may not eliminate election fraud, they can reduce election-day fraud at the polling stations they visit. The unusual advantage of experiment-like conditions for this study offers unique causal evidence that international actors can have direct, measurable effects on the level of election-day fraud and, by extension, on the democratization process.

Democracy Assistance to Domestic Election Monitoring Organizations: Conditions for Success

Can the international community effectively promote and support – sometimes even create – domestic civil society? Supporting civic reformers is now a common practice in the international democratization policy repertoire. Behind this practice lies the idea that strengthening civic actors improves the chances for democratic transition and consolidation. This article investigates conditions for successful democracy assistance to civic actors through comparative study of six domestic election monitoring organizations in the Americas. The article argues that both international and domestic context matter. A history of soft power (diplomatic, normative) intervention and low internal polarization create relatively favourable conditions for democracy assistance to civic actors. In cases with a history of hard power intervention (such as use of force or economic sanctions) and high political polarization, intervening variables, such as multilateral provision of democracy assistance and pluralistic structures and behaviours on the part of aid recipients, can surmount unfavourable conditions for international democracy assistance. In the absence of such mitigating conditions, democracy assistance to civic actors may be ill-advised.

Toward a New Economic Constitution: Judicial Disciplines on Trade Politics

This article first observes that protectionism is an icon of trade politics and thus likely to gather fresh momentum as a domestic election approaches. The paper then problematizes protectionism beyond mere seasonal election politics by revealing its fatal pathologies both to the United States and to the rest of the world. Protectionism basically caters to the special interest at the expense of the larger public interest, which may be coined as a Madisonian constitutional failure. It also deviates from global trading norms, which the United States hypocritically continues to preach adherence to for the rest of the world. This double standard creates images of American Exceptionalism and undermines the effectiveness of the multilateral trading system. As a solution, the paper suggests certain judicial options to discipline protectionist trade politics, such as structural and substantive due process as well as internalization of free trade principles. It argues that measures suspected as protection should undergo strict scrutiny, and should fail absent compelling justifications for them. It also submits that certain essential global trading norms, such as the non-discrimination principle, may be internalized by the Court under constitutional doctrines, such as Charming Betsy.

Reflection on the activities and contributions of the Coalition of Domestic Election Observers (CODEO) to the success of Ghana’s 2000 elections: lessons for other African countries

Reflection on the activities and contributions of the Coalition of Domestic Election Observers (CODEO) to the success of Ghana’s 2000 elections: lessons for other African countries

External factors in Israel's 1999 elections

Israel’s 1999 elections drew considerable international interest, but claims of foreign interference are exaggerated. The statements and preferences of Arab leaders reveal much about their understanding and views of Israel, while American officials were careful not to directly enter the fray, despite perceptions to the contrary. Russia’s introduction into Israel’s domestic elections is an intriguing result of Israel’s demographic changes over the past decade.

The shadow of the polls: Electoral effects on international agreements

Using Putnam's (1988) metaphor of two‐level games, we consider the relationship between international agreements and domestic elections. We develop a Reversion Point game to reflect the anarchy of the international system. In this game, deals last only as long as both sides continue to support them. When nations form international agreements, they do so knowing how these agreements affect future renegotiations. Rather than model the electorate as an informal ratifier of agreements, we assume that voters make deliberate choices about which party to elect. Since agreements made prior to an election affect the deals that are renegotiated following an election, today's agreements affect which party the electorate prefer to renegotiate agreements in the future. Thus, agreements affect the outcome of elections. A government's strategy in negotiations is therefore affected by how deals influence future renegotiation and elections. We characterize the circumstances under which elections compel governments to accept agreements that myopically they do not support or reject agreements that are myopically favorable.

Electoral Rights for Non–Nationals

The question whether non-nationals can take part in domestic elections at local, regional or national level is of major theoretical and practical significance. Under the new Dutch constitution, non-Dutch residents can for the first time be given the right by law to vote and stand in local council elections. After casting a glance over the border at the situation in other countries, the writer raises the question of whether the present revision of the constitution is not too limited in that it restricts these rights to local council elections.