Partisanship, Threats, and Violence: Unraveling the Complex Dynamics in American Democracy

By LAUREL HARBRIDGE-YONG (Professor, Northwestern University) and ALEXANDRA FILINDRA (Associate Professor, University of Illinois Chicago)

In 2020, Seattle mayor Jenny Durkan announced that she would not be seeking re-election. A central reason was threats of violence against her and her family. Ms. Durkan is not alone. In recent years, threats and violence have targeted public health officials, school board members, Congress members and staff, state legislators, mayors, and local election officials, among others. Several organizations such as the U.S. Capitol Police, the National League of Cities, the Bridging Divides Initiative, and the Brennan Center have produced reports raising concerns about this accelerating phenomenon and its potentially harmful effects on victims – officeholders and staff – and American democratic institutions. In 2022-2023, we conducted 110 in-depth interviews with subnational elected officials and staff. Everyone reported experiences with incivility, most respondents recounted threats of violence, and a small minority were exposed to actual violence. Clearly, America faces a problem of deteriorating democratic norms and an uptick in political violence.

In the face of this political landscape, we sought to understand how the partisan public responds to such events. When it comes to evaluating threats and violence against elected officials, does the public apply a consistent standard, informed by democratic norms, or does partisanship shape their evaluations? And if partisanship shapes their evaluations, do we face a vicious cycle where learning about political violence targeting your own party leads people to justify further political violence? Our initial research suggests that while partisanship shapes some aspects of public evaluations, people evaluate threats and violence similarly, regardless of the party targeted, and do not rationalize violence or become radicalized themselves; all hopeful signs for our democratic institutions.

Despite criticism of incivility and aggression from both sides of the political aisle, evaluations of civil, uncivil, and aggressive or violent behavior may not be politically neutral. This is because partisanship is a core part of people’s identity and shapes how they interpret events and information. Partisan identities create strong in-groups (copartisans) and out-groups (opposing partisans). Political scientists have shown that in-group favoritism is associated with different yardsticks for evaluating in-group and out-group legislators. Partisanship also plays a role in how people understand misbehavior. Partisans are more willing to rationalize and excuse in-group leaders’ misbehavior. They also  evaluate norms breaking by the in-group less severely than similar behavior by the out-group, and rationalize undemocratic behaviors if they promote desired policies. This suggests that incivility, threats, and even violence perpetrated by co-partisans toward an opposing party legislator may not be viewed as seriously or be seen as concerning as the same behaviors by opposing partisans toward a co-partisan legislator.

Another concern about the public response to threats and violence against elected officials is that learning about threats or violence, particularly if they are perpetrated by members of the opposing party and target an elected official from one’s in-group, might increase people’s willingness to rationalize violence or engage in violence themselves. We know that the public’s response to political violence is shaped by social identities.  When group identities are under threat, partisans can be induced to become radicalized and endorse violence towards members of the other side. Even though few endorse actual violence (e.g., physically harming people), support for the principle of political violence can nevertheless be harmful as it weakens democratic norms. 

We assessed public evaluations of threats and violence in two ways. First, we assessed whether the public differentiates between civil, uncivil, threatening, and violent interactions between constituents and elected officials when partisanship is not mentioned. We asked survey respondents to evaluate 40 short descriptions of interactions between constituents and an elected official. After reading each description, respondents selected which words best describe the behavior: civil, appropriate, uncivil, inappropriate, violent, and criminal. Second, we used a survey experiment to examine whether the partisanship of the elected official and constituents shaped the public’s response. Survey respondents read a mock news story that described an incident between a Senator and a large group of his constituents. This incident was described as a civil townhall meeting, a civil protest, a protest with threats made toward the Senator, or a protest with violence directed toward the Senator. We also randomized the partisanship of the Senator. The constituents were always described as being in the opposing party than the Senator.

The results of the first study suggest that people do recognize differences in civility/appropriateness within democratic politics as well as the severity of incidents; incivility is distinct from threats and violence. First, even when constituents are critical of the politician, people distinguish between responses that are civil from those that are uncivil or slurs. Second, people view uncivil interactions and slurs similarly. Third, people view threats and violence as distinct from merely uncivil interactions. Finally, although there are some similarities in how people view threats and violence in democratic politics, violence tends to be evaluated more harshly than threats. Importantly, Democrats and Republican evaluate these incidents similarly. Without the presence of partisan cues, the public recognizes what behaviors are inconsistent with democratic norms and which are not.

When people evaluate incidents where they know the partisanship of the elected official and the constituents, partisanship plays a more limited role than some scholarly literature might suggest. Regardless of whether the targeted Senator is from the in-group or the out-group, partisans in the public recognize threatening and violent protests as less appropriate and less civil than a civil townhall or civil protest and identify them as more criminal and violent. The partisanship of the target has no bearing on these evaluations. While in-group attachments do shape evaluations of the out-group when constituents from the opposing party target a Senator from your own party with threats or violence – i.e., feelings toward the opposing party and evaluations of the traits of party identifiers reflect greater animosity in the threats and violence conditions – there is little evidence that an attack against an in-group legislator leads people to rationalize violence or become radicalized toward violence. In today’s era of heightened partisan animosity, these are encouraging signs for our democratic politics. However, they leave open a question of whether responses to threats or violence from political elites – elected officials, major figureheads in the party, or partisan media organizations – might inflame partisanship and lead people to rationalize violence. This is the subject of our ongoing work. We are also probing the strength of the null findings in our experiment by exploring whether attacks on the partisan in-group increase animosity and support for violence if we raise the stakes of the vignette experiment – focusing on an issue the respondent views as moral in nature and where electoral competition between the parties is salient.

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Laurel Harbridge-Yong is a Professor of Political Science and a Faculty Fellow at the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University. She received her PhD in 2009 from Stanford University. Her research and teaching explores questions surrounding partisan conflict and the difficulty of reaching bipartisan agreements and legislative compromises in American politics. Her work spans projects on the U.S. Congress, state legislatures, and the mass public. She is the author of two books – Is Bipartisanship Dead? Policy Agreement and Agenda-Setting in the House of Representatives (2015) and Rejecting Compromise: Legislators’ Fear of Primary Voters (with Sarah Anderson and Daniel Butler, 2020) – and numerous journal articles.  

Her research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, Unite America, the National Science Foundation Time Sharing Experiments in the Social Sciences (TESS), the Social Science Research Council, and the Dirksen Congressional Center, among others. Her current research projects examine how primary elections shape representation, and how threats and violence against elected officials shape legislative behavior and whether the public rationalizes the use of political violence. 

Laurel is the EIP’s 2023 IFES Mannatt Fellow.

Election observers are important for democracy – but few voters know what they do

Authors: Thomas Molony (Senior Lecturer in African Studies, The University of Edinburgh); Robert Macdonald (Research Fellow in African Studies, The University of Edinburgh)

Originally Published in the Conversation February 23, 2023 2.11am EST

Members of a European Union election observation team speak to voters in Zimbabwe. Marco Longari/AFP via Getty Images

Election observers keep watch over polls throughout the world. Their job is to support efforts to improve electoral quality and to provide transparency. In African countries, both local citizen and international observers have been deployed regularly since the 1990s.

During several recent elections across the continent, however, questions have arisen about the competence and impartiality of observation missions. This has led to concerns about the future of observation, both in Africa and elsewhere.

In 2023, more than 20 African countries are scheduled to go to the polls. It will be a busy year for observers who’ll be present at the majority of these elections.

When done well, election observation detects ballot-box stuffing, voter suppression and political violence. Observers’ presence at polling stations deters election-day fraud.

Observers also provide public statements about election quality and offer recommendations on how electoral processes could be improved.

Yet some observers have been criticised for a reluctance to point out flawed processes, for holding biases and for weaknesses in their methodologies.

The perception that observation missions’ verdicts were “proved wrong” by court judgements in Kenya (2017) and Malawi (2019) has been particularly damaging. In both cases, many commentators (mis)interpreted international observers’ statements as endorsements of electoral processes that the courts later annulled.

It’s not clear how widely held these critical views are. The perspectives of the broader public in countries holding elections are often missing from discussions on observation. So we set out to get a sense of what voters in three African countries thought.

We found that people wanted to know more about election observers, but couldn’t easily get the information. Both the media and observers need to do more to provide it. Knowledge of observers’ goals and statements is essential if they are to play the role of public arbiters of election quality.

What Citizens think

Our research into citizen perceptions and media representations of election observation took place in Zambia, The Gambia and Kenya. These three countries have had varying experiences of election observation.

We interviewed 520 citizens about topics relating to their perceptions of election observation. In each country, we conducted in-depth interviews in both urban and rural areas, and in constituencies that supported the opposition and the incumbent.

Ordinary citizens in our case study countries rarely offered criticisms of election observation.

For example, we asked 120 Kenyans to evaluate the past performance of election observers during the run-up to the country’s 2022 election. Only one person referred to the controversy surrounding observation in 2017 and the supreme court’s annulment of the presidential election.

Instead, we found strong support for election observation among citizens. This was the case in all three of our case study countries, which cover east, southern and west Africa.

Our respondents tended to have concerns about the electoral process in their own country. They spoke favourably about the potential of observation to improve overall electoral quality and transparency. They also felt that observers contributed to reducing the potentially destabilising effects of elections, such as violence.

In both Zambia and Kenya, support for the presence of international observers was higher than support for citizen observers. Respondents in The Gambia, however, tended to prefer citizen observers.

The explanations from those who chose international observers highlighted a perception that they were more impartial than citizen observers, who were often viewed as being biased or corruptible.

Perceptions in Zambia and Kenya may be influenced by:

• political polarisation

• a perception that political corruption is high

• the prominence of ethnicity in politics.

These factors appear to reduce confidence in citizen observers.

Despite the popularity of election observers in our case study countries, we found that citizens knew little about their roles. Few could name any specific observation missions. Citizens often confused observers with other electoral actors like polling station staff, the electoral management body and party agents.

It’s common for citizens to believe observers can and should intervene in the electoral process. Yet, non-interference should be a key principle for both citizen and international election observers.

The information gap

Our interviews made it clear that citizens – especially those in rural areas – found it difficult to get information about the activities and statements of election observers. Few of the respondents heard this information when missions issued their preliminary statements.

The media can bridge this information gap by providing more coverage of election observation.

The quality of this coverage could also be improved, as observers’ preliminary statements are often mischaracterised.

Observers’ statements tend to be complex and nuanced because they are commenting on numerous aspects of an ongoing process. In media coverage, these statements are often reduced to simple either/or judgements (such as “free and fair”).

Way forward

Our project has drawn upon interviews with African journalists and editors to create a short list of tips on covering election observation. These are designed to improve the circulation of accurate information. The tips include getting a range of perspectives from observer missions and reaching out to them early.

Observer missions could also be more active in raising the profile of their work. We created a list of suggestions from the media in our three case study countries to help them do this. One of the tips is to interact with the media in local languages.

Citizens are more likely to criticise observers for the poor flow of information than for anything else. This doesn’t invalidate other criticisms of observers. In fact, if citizens begin to get more information, these criticisms may become more common. Our research suggests the media and observers need to provide it anyway.

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Disclosure Statement:

Thomas Molony receives funding from the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), for the ‘Local Perceptions and Media Representations of Election Observation in Africa’ research project, under grant reference ES/T015624/1.

Robert Macdonald receives funding from the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), for the ‘Local Perceptions and Media Representations of Election Observation in Africa’ research project, under grant reference ES/T015624/1.

Local election offices often are missing on social media – and the information they do post often gets ignored

Originally published August 31, 2022 8.27am EDT on The Conversation.

Authors: Thessalia Merivaki and Mara Suttmann-Lea

Local election officials are trying to share voting information with the public on social media but may be missing some key platforms – and the voters who use them.

In early July 2022, for instance, young voters in Boone County, Missouri, complained that they had missed the registration deadline to vote in the county’s Aug. 2 primary election. They claimed no one “spread the word on social media.” The local election office in that county actually has a social media presence on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok. But its accounts don’t have many followers and aren’t as active as, say, celebrity or teenage accounts are. As a result, election officials’ messages may never reach their audience.

The Boone County example raises important questions about how prospective voters can get informed about elections, starting with whether or not local election officials are active on social media and whether they use these platforms effectively to “spread the word.”

In our research as scholars of voter participation and electoral processes, we find that when local election officials not only have social media accounts but use them to distribute information about voting, voters of all ages – but particularly young voters – are more likely to register to vote, to cast ballots and to have their ballots counted.

For example, during the 2020 election, Florida voters who lived in counties where the county supervisor of elections shared information about how to register to vote on Facebook, and included a link to Florida’s online voter registration system, were more likely to complete the voter registration process and use online voter registration.

In North Carolina, we found that voters whose county board of elections used Facebook to share clear information about voting by mail were more likely to have their mailed ballots acceptedthan mail voters whose county boards did not share instructions on social media.

Young people face distinct voting challenges

Voter participation among young voters, those between the ages of 18 and 24, has increased in recent elections, but still lags behind that of older voters. One reason is that younger voters have not yet established a habit of voting.

Even when they do try to vote, young voters face more barriers to participation than more experienced voters. They are more likely than older people to make errors or omissions on their voter registration applications and therefore not be successfully registered.

When they do successfully complete the registration process, they have more trouble casting a vote that will count, especially when it comes to following all the steps required for voting by mail. When they try to vote in person, evidence from recent elections shows high provisional voting rates in college towns, suggesting college students may also experience trouble in casting a regular ballot owing to confusion about finding their polling place, or because they are not registered to vote because their voter registration application was not successfully processed.

Some of these problems exist because voters, especially young ones, don’t know what they need to do to meet the voter eligibility requirements set by state election laws. Those laws often require registering weeks or months in advance of Election Day, or changing their registration information even if they move within a community.

Social media as a tool to ‘spread the word’

Social media can be a way to get this important information out to a wider audience, including to the young voters who are more likely to need it.

Younger people use social media more than older voters, with a strong preference for platforms such as YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat.

News outlets and political campaigns use social media heavily. But our analysis finds that the vast majority of local election officials don’t even have social media accounts beyond Facebook. And, when they do, it is likely that they are not effectively reaching their audience.

Gaps in how local election officials use social media

We have found that during the 2020 U.S. presidential election, 33% of county election offices had Facebook accounts. Facebook is the most commonly used social media platform among Americans of all ages. But two-thirds of county election offices didn’t even have a Facebook account.

Just 9% of county election offices had Twitter accounts, and fewer than 2% had accounts on Instagram or TikTok, which are more popular with young voters than Twitter or Faceboook.

Using social media for voter education

Local election officials are charged with sharing information about the voting process – including the mechanics of registering and voting, as well as official lists of candidates and ballot questions.

Their default method of making this information available is often to share it on their own government websites. But young voters’ regular use of social media presents an opportunity for officials to be more active and engaged on those sites.

While many election officials around the country face budget and staffing pressures, as well as threats to their safety, our research confirms that when officials do get involved on social media, young voters benefit – as does democracy itself.

Thessalia Merivaki is Assistant Professor of American Politics at Mississippi State University.

Mara Suttmann-Lea is Assistant Professor of Government, Connecticut College

Disclosure Statement

Thessalia (Lia) Merivaki is an Assistant Professor of American Politics at the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at Mississippi State University and a member of the Carter Center's U.S. Elections Expert Study Team. She has received funding from the MIT Election Data and Science Lab (MEDSL) and the Scholars Strategy Network (SSN). She is also affiliated with the Election Community Network (ECN).

Mara Suttmann-Lea is an Assistant Professor of American Politics in the Department of Government and International Relations at Connecticut College. They have received funding from the MIT Election Data and Science Lab and the Social Science Research Council.

How does Australia’s voting system work?

Originally published May 17, 2022 3.06am EDT on The Conversation.

Author: Malcolm Mackerras

As you head to your local polling place this Saturday, or cast your ballot in an early vote, it’s worth pondering: how does Australia’s voting system really work, anyway?

The fundamentals of our electoral system have been shaped by democratic values enshrined in Australia’s Constitution and pragmatic decisions made by federal politicians since 1901.

I’ve been studying elections and electoral systems for some 65 years.

Here’s what you need to know to understand how the vote you cast this election fits into the bigger picture.

How long are politicians’ terms?

For members of the House of Representatives – three years.

Section 28 of the Constitution says:

Every House of Representatives shall continue for three years from the first meeting of the House, and no longer, but may be sooner dissolved by the Governor-General.

Since the prime minister advises the governor general, it means he or she makes the exact choice of date. Many people object to that, but I don’t. That power hasn’t been abused.

The now dissolved term (the 46th Parliament) was elected in May 2019, so it has run a full term.

Why do we have more seats in the House than the Senate?

The Constitution says there must be approximately double the number of seats in the House compared to the Senate.

Section 24 says:

The House of Representatives shall be composed of members directly chosen by the people of the Commonwealth, and the number of such members shall be, as nearly as practicable, twice the number of the senators.

The September 1946 election saw 74 members of the House of Representatives elected to the 18th Parliament (1946-49). There were 36 senators then, six from each of the six states.

Since 1984 there have been 76 senators, 12 from each state and two from each territory.

There are currently 151 seats in the House, which therefore meets the requirement “as nearly as practicable twice the number” of senators.

How are electoral boundaries drawn?

Electoral boundaries are drawn so there are similar numbers of voters in each seat.

Section 24 of the Constitution reads:

The number of members chosen in the several States shall be in proportion to the respective numbers of their people…

The number of 151 electorates was determined mid-way during the 45th Parliament (2016-19). In August 2017 the electoral commissioner, Tom Rogers, issued the latest population statistics and determined there should be 47 members from New South Wales, 38 Victoria, 30 Queensland, 16 Western Australia, 10 South Australia, five Tasmania, three ACT and two for the Northern Territory.

Where necessary, electoral boundaries are re-drawn according to the principle of “one vote, one value” or, as I prefer to say, equal representation for equal numbers of people.

In July 2020, Rogers acknowledged population growth was above average in Victoria and below average in Western Australia.

That is why the forthcoming election will see 39 members elected in Victoria (up one) and 15 in WA (down one). New boundaries will apply in those two states and the redistributions have been done fairly and with maximum transparency, as always.

Elsewhere the boundaries will be the same as in May 2019.

How are Senators elected?

Since 1949 the system has been one of proportional representation.

That means within each state six Senate seats are roughly distributed according to a party’s share of the vote. So a party getting about 12% of the vote would win one seat, about 26% two seats, about 40% three seats and so on.

This is why the Greens do so well at Senate elections compared to the House of Representatives. With about 10% of the vote for both houses, they presently have nine senators but only one member of the House of Representatives.

This differs from preferential voting for the House of Representatives, introduced in 1918, where voters number candidates in the order of their preferences – first choice, second choice and so on.

How long are senators’ terms?

Senators from the states serve six year terms, and those from the territories serve three year terms.

However, a system of rotation means half the senators’ terms end every three years. So in most elections, half the Senate spots are contested.

But there’s an exception to this rule. Every so often there’s a “double dissolution”, where the entire Senate is elected. That happened most recently in 2016. This parliament was dissolved early because there was a dispute between the two houses, so the entire parliament faced the people.

In a double dissolution, half the senators from the states get three year terms instead of six. This is based on the number of votes.

One Nation’s Pauline Hanson and Larissa Waters of the Greens are good examples of how it works.

Both were elected among the 12 Queenslanders at the 2016 election. However, Hanson was one of the six more popular vote winners, and Waters one of the six less popular vote winners. So, Hanson got a six-year term and Waters a three-year term.

Waters won a higher proportion of votes in the 2019 election, so was elected to a six-year term, expiring on June 30 2025.

Hanson is up for re-election this year, and I predict she will be elected to a six-year term, and therefore her term would expire on 30 June 2028.

Issues with our voting system

About 16.5 million votes will be cast for each house of parliament.

Based on the last two federal elections, I estimate the informal vote will be roughly 800,000 for the House of Representatives (4.9%) and 650,000 for the Senate (3.9%).

By world standards that’s a high number of informal votes, which is thought by many to be a blot on our democracy.

Two reasons for this are because we have compulsory voting, and because ballot papers are unnecessarily complex and voter unfriendly, particularly for the Senate.

The United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada and New Zealand have voluntary voting and simple one-house ballot papers, and the rate of informal voting is negligible. Some argue we should copy them.

There’s also a lack of rules around campaign finance – the stand-out case being the obscene spending by Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party.

I argue there’s no need to reform the Constitution and the democratic values it upholds. But there should be legislative changes to improve the system. I expect some democratic reforms during the next term, 2022-25, the 47th Parliament.

These changes wouldn’t require a referendum, just negotiation to ensure passage through both houses. By contrast, changes to the Constitution require a referendum. For that reason reforms by referendum are rare.

Malcolm Mackerras is Distinguished Fellow at the PM Glynn Institute, Australian Catholic University.

Why public trust in elections is being undermined by global disinformation campaigns

Originally published April 28, 2022 10.27am EDT on The Conversation.

Author: Christoph Bluth

Public trust in elections is being targeted around the world by a series of disinformation campaigns from a range of international players. This is giving rise to an increasing lack of trust in how votes are counted.

The almost unlimited capacity for individuals and organisations to publish information using websites (only limited by time and manpower), social media and other outlets has given disinformation campaigns a set of new media to manipulate in the last decade.

With the Brazilian election coming up this autumn, analysts have already suggested that public trust in voting processes is being targeted, with similar tactics to those used around the last US presidential election. Like former US president Donald Trump, Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro has started undermining public confidence in the democratic process by claiming that elections were fraudulent.

Bolsonaro has also raised questions about both electronic voting and the vote-counting process.

Disinformation campaigns often begin well before elections to create confusion and allow the losers to challenge results. During Mexico’s 2021 election disinformation was spread through social networks in a bitter and polarised campaign. There was evidence of organised trolls spreading insults and attacks against candidates, and a rise in fake news stories about the election.

These tactics are being used across the world. The European Parliament said the “most systemic threats to political processes and human rights arise from organised attempts to run coordinated campaigns across multiple social media platforms”. A 2019 report discovered evidence of organised social media manipulation campaigns in 70 different countries, employing armies of “cyber troops” (300,000 in China for instance) to influence public opinion on various issues, and create political chaos. And a US foundation has raised concerns about new state laws shifting election administration powers to political or partisan bodies.

People voting in Mexico’s 2021 election where social media disinformation and fake news tactics were widely reported.Reuters/Alamy

A Chinese disinformation campaign to discredit presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen, and another against Hong Kong’s pro-democracy activists were reported on. Twitter took down 900 fake accounts used by the Chinese authorities and another 200,000 new accounts linked with another Chinese network.

How do they work?

Disinformation campaigns often rely on an enormous volume of messages, using a variety of methods. They use traditional media such as newspapers, radio broadcasts and television, but disinformation is also spread via websites, social media, chat rooms, and satellite broadcasting and include a whole mix of texts, photographs and videos using thousands of fake accounts.

Internet “troll farms” are often set up, with teams of people putting out misleading messages to counter political viewpoints or other narratives. These farms employ workers on 12-hour shifts, 24 hours a day, with daily quotas of 135 posted messages per day, per worker.

One example is the Russian Internet Research Agency (also known as Glavset), ostensibly a private company but one that appears to be funded by the Russian government(now operating under different guises as part of “Project Lakhta”). It spreads Kremlin disinformation on social media using false identities and false information, under different names.

Using a variety of sources that employ different narratives and arguments but point to the same conclusion is more persuasive, because it conceals the fact that the propaganda ultimately derives from the same source. A study conducted by the Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government on the use of Twitter as a forum for disinformation found: “Evidence from an analysis of Twitter data reveals that Russian social media trolls exploited racial and political identities to infiltrate distinct groups of authentic users, playing on their group identities.”

Russia is also accused of mounting various campaigns to influence elections, including the presidential elections in the US in 2016 and 2020. Academic analysis of how the Russian Internet Research Agency used social media showed how they specifically targeted “self-described Christian patriots, supporters of the Republican party and of presidential candidate Donald Trump”.

The Russian governing elite believes that the west is committed to transforming the post-Soviet countries using non-military instruments of warfare, including economic instruments, the spreading of ideas about democracy and human rights, and support for NGOs and human rights activists with the purpose of inducing “colour revolutions” that will topple governments. By conducting information warfare Russia claims it is only responding to western methods.

The overall purpose is to create mistrust of the core institutions of liberal democracy including parliaments, mainstream media, elections and the judiciary.

Governments can respond by introducing regulations to combat the spread of disinformation, but this is controversial because it forces governments to define the limits of free speech. In practice, it means introducing and further developing elaborate codes of practice and guidelines for the internet and social media. Another tool is the development of fact-checkingnetworks.

If disinformation creates a widespread public belief that elections are “stolen” or manipulated, it undermines belief in public institutions that are essential to democratic governance. Therefore such disinformation campaigns can pose a very serious threat to liberal democracy and public order. This is the outcome that some of the state actors are seeking. The development of the instruments to deal with this challenge is only just beginning.

Christoph Bluth is Professor of International Relations and Security at the University of Bradford

Ireland has moved to improve electoral integrity – other countries should follow suit

Originally published July 15, 2022 on LSE’s EUROPP

Authors: Harsh Vasani, Toby James, and Holly Ann Garnett

On 13 July, Ireland passed an Electoral Reform Bill aimed at improving the country’s electoral integrity. Harsh Vasani, Toby S. James and Holly Ann Garnett assess the likely impact of the bill and the potential lessons other countries could draw from it.

Throughout the world, there have been concerns democracy has been ‘backsliding’ and that electoral integrity is under threat. A Summit for Democracy was hosted by the United States in December last year to ‘set forth an affirmative agenda for democratic renewal and to tackle the greatest threats faced by democracies’. Countries have been asked to make commitments to how they will improve democracy and elections.

The Irish government committed to establishing an independent statutory Electoral Commission. Academic research on electoral integrity and international best practices are clear that those involved in running and regulating elections should be independent from those standing from elections. However, many countries retain a system whereby government minsters have considerable control over electoral watchdogs, which compromises their independence. When Ireland gained independence from Britain, it established a system whereby elections were in the portfolio of a government minister and department – most recently the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.

This commitment to establish a statutory, independent Electoral Commission for Ireland was honoured when an Electoral Reform Bill was passed on 13 July. But the Bill went further. The bill also promises the regulation of online political advertising with the aim of ensuring ‘transparency during electoral campaigns and… that our elections remain free from hidden influences on how we vote’.

The legislation came amidst calls to ban cryptocurrency donations to political parties. Given the identity of donors can be concealed when using cryptocurrencies, there are concerns such donations could create an avenue for foreign funding to influence election results. Donations made to political parties will also be scrutinised and the leader of each political party will have to declare to the Standards in Public Office Commission all donations to the party from outside the state, including all contributions, whether in cash or kind. Political parties will also be required to declare all the properties they own.

These reforms are important, too. The wider context is that there are major concerns about the possibility of foreign interference in elections. The alleged Russian interference in US elections cast light on the dangers of foreign interference in elections and manipulation of the electorate. It has been suggested that we have therefore entered an era of ‘cyber elections’.

Ireland’s electoral integrity weak spots

The legislation has been in the news for many weeks vis-à-vis electoral funding, foreign interference, online disinformation, and empowering the election commission. But does it speak to the problems that Ireland actually faces with elections?

The Electoral Integrity Project recently published the 2022 Electoral Integrity Global Report that scores countries on the quality of electoral integrity around the world. The report evaluates all aspects of elections – from the laws through the campaign and voter registration. The report is based on a rolling survey of 4,591 experts across 169 countries. Figure 1 illustrates Ireland’s areas of strength and weakness over the past decade. The data from the Electoral Integrity Project is available online here.

Figure 1: Country-level scores for electoral integrity in Ireland

Note: The figure is based on the Perceptions of Electoral Integrity (PEI-8.0) index, 2012-21.

The data shows that Ireland scores the poorest on voter registration. The scores on voter registration were 34 for the period of 2012-18. A comparison with Finland (95-96), Sweden (88-90) and Denmark (93-91), the three highest scorers on the perceptions of electoral integrity (PEI) index, illustrates just how poorly Ireland fares on perceptions of voter registration.

The voter registration index is measured on indicators such as whether some citizens were not listed in the register, the electoral register was inaccurate, or some ineligible electors were registered. Figure 2 illustrates the extent to which these were a problem on a five-point scale. Citizens missing from the electoral register was the greatest problem – but it was also the case that the register contained ineligible electors.

Figure 2: Electoral registration problems in Ireland

Note: The figure is based on the Perceptions of Electoral Integrity (PEI-8.0) index, 2012-21.

The good news is that the Bill also contains provisions to improve voter registration. These include a move to continuous registration based on an individual application, data sharing to assist registration authorities in updating and maintaining the register, and annual reporting by registration authorities to the newly established Commission.

The establishment of the Commission could therefore play an important role in redressing these problems in the coming years. In particular, the legislation enables the Commission to undertake research on the accuracy and completeness of the register – research which has generated important insights in the UK to reveal the extent of the ‘missing millions’.

Other dimensions of electoral integrity have fared better in Ireland. Vote counting and results work very well. The electoral finance index is more troubled with a score of 64. But it is worth noting that problems with money and elections are a huge problem worldwide – the Electoral Integrity Project report found that it was the weakest aspect of elections worldwide. The world should therefore watch closely to see if Ireland’s new legislation works – and whether there is an improvement in future report scores.

Looking forward: automatic voter registration?

Given that voter registration is the main weakness, it is notable that there are, however, policy fixes which are not legislated for, which should be considered in future years as the Electoral Reform Bill beds in. Many countries have recently moved to introduce some aspect of automatic voter registration. Rather than relying on individual applications (a requirement for individual applications reduces voter registration levels), voters can be registered by the authorities without requiring electors to take action. Comparative research shows that this can improve completeness and does not affect accuracy.

It is difficult for countries like Ireland to introduce this system without a civil population register. A more appropriate approach, as a recent voter registration report shows, is therefore to automatically enrol the population when they reach critical life moments such as becoming eligible to vote for the first time. Nonetheless, Ireland has been proactive in responding to the call to strengthen democratic electoral institutions. Other countries should do the same, and the Electoral Integrity Report can help them to do so.

Harsh Vasani is a PhD student in the School of Development at the University of East Anglia.

Toby S. James is Professor of Politics and Public Policy at the University of East Anglia. He is co-Director of the Electoral Integrity Project and Editor in Chief of Policy Studies.

Holly Ann Garnett is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario, and cross-appointed faculty at Queen’s University, in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. She is co-Director of the Electoral Integrity Project.

Featured image credit: European Council

Scotland is ready to run the May elections, despite the pandemic

Alistair Clark, Newcastle University and Toby James, University of East Anglia

Important Scottish parliament elections are scheduled for May 2021 and the expectation is that the Scottish National Party will emerge as the biggest party, potentially even with enough votes to form a majority government, after ruling as a minority since 2016.

However, it has been argued by former first minister Henry McLeish, among others that these elections, should be postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said that she sees “no reason at this stage why the election wouldn’t go ahead”. The subtext for critics might be “why would she, with the polls so favourable?” Victory for the SNP would allow it to claim a mandate for a second independence referendum. This is, therefore, a historic political opportunity for the SNP to realise that goal. It could be a defining moment for Scotland and the UK.

Election postponements are deeply political and there is often an incentive for those in power to keep or switch the date for political advantage. But in this case, Sturgeon doesn’t need to be playing politics. The lead in the polls is sizeable and has been consistent – often by more than 30 percentage points. So a delay would be unlikely to make a difference.

Also, Scotland is in good shape to hold these elections. Electoral administrators and policymakers have been planning in depth for COVID-19 mitigations for May’s elections since at least mid-2020.

The Scottish parliament has the power to legislate on electoral law for Scottish parliament and local elections. At the end of December, it passed the Scottish General Election (Coronavirus) Bill. This provides for a range of contingencies to allow the elections to proceed. Crucially, this was passed on a cross-party basis, with 117 votes for and none against. Scotland was also unique among the UK’s four electoral jurisdictions in allowing a few council byelections to be held late in 2020, so Scottish electoral administrators have some experience of conducting elections under COVID-19 circumstances. This situation contrasts with the renewed debate in England, where no such cross-party legislation has yet been developed.

How elections will work

The contingency legislation for the Scottish elections contains various measures to make voting possible within the confines of coronavirus rules.

To minimise traffic at polling stations, for example, more people will be encouraged to vote by post. Pre-pandemic, rates of postal voting had already been on the increase – up from 11.2% in 2007 to 18% in 2016. Levels of postal voting under pandemic conditions are expected to be around 40%, but the legislation makes it possible for the vote to be held entirely by post, if that’s necessary.

Postal voting is logistically complex. It takes time to register voters for it and to implement the various security measures that legislation rightly provides for. The Scottish government is providing extra funding to electoral registration officers to ensure they have the resources to process increased numbers of postal votes. If the vote does have to be fully postal, the elections will need to be postponed for six months.

The legislation allows for additional contingencies should the pandemic worsen. There has been discussion about extending voting over several days to help with social distancing. This was put into place in Queensland, Australia and is often recommended. It would be logistically challenging and may necessitate a delayed election. Provision has been made for this in the Scottish General Election (Coronavirus) Act, allowing ministers to extend voting on the recommendation of the Electoral Management Board. The expectation remains that the election will be held over one day.

Provision has also been made should MSPs need to delay returning to parliament to choose a first minister because of the pandemic. Regardless of any potential postponement, the elections have to be held by November 5 2021.

Making it happen

A widespread public education campaign will be key to ensuring the May 2021 Scottish parliament elections are a success. This should focus on the need to register early for postal votes. Often voters leave this to close to the deadline. Doing so in 2021 could lead to considerable pressure on electoral administrators. It could also lead to voters missing the deadline. This could mean that they have to attend polling stations, increasing the risk of spreading coronavirus. This postal vote campaign needs to start now. It needs to use all available channels of communication.

There needs also to be clear communication to the media, to voters and political parties that counts will take longer. Results are unlikely to be available overnight.

Communicating what to expect in polling stations will also be important. Voters will find social distancing in place, where appropriate, with one-way systems and possible limits on numbers in polling stations. There will be regular sanitisation and an expectation that voters will wear face coverings. In recent years, there has been a conspiracy theory and movement against pencils in polling booths (using #UsePens on social media), suggesting that pencil marks are insecure and might be changed. In 2021, voters may actually have to take their own instead of using a shared pencil, or single-use pens or pencils may have to be provided.

A fine balance will need to be struck on any future decisions if the Scottish pandemic gets worse. Principles of electoral integrity normally suggest that decisions should be made as early as possible to allow voters, parties and administrators time to adapt. The pandemic puts pressure on this principle – and changing conditions may require a last-minute rethink. But as it stands, Scotland has put in much of the preparatory work and appears ready to conduct these crucially important polls as originally scheduled.

Alistair Clark, Reader in Politics, Newcastle University and Toby James, Professor of Politics and Public Policy, University of East Anglia

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Disclosure statement:

Alistair Clark has received funding from the ESRC, British Academy, Nuffield Foundation and The Leverhulme Trust.

Toby James' research has been externally funded by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust, British Academy, Leverhulme Trust, AHRC, ESRC, Nuffield Foundation, SSHRC and the McDougall Trust.

UK government has delayed elections longer than most countries – and England still isn’t ready to hold pandemic votes in May

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Toby James, University of East Anglia and Alistair Clark, Newcastle University

Which activities are essential during a pandemic? Across England, school buildings have been closed, as have many shops, businesses and sports facilities. So what about elections? Should they go ahead? It’s an important question since local elections are scheduled to take place in the UK in May.

Among them are the English elections that were originally meant to take place in May 2020 but were postponed because of the pandemic. That means that as well as votes in Scotland and Wales, a bumper set of contests is now scheduled in England for May 2021. There will be votes for English councils, police and crime commissioners, the London mayor, the London Assembly, regional mayors and local mayors.

There has been some speculation that these too might be postponed. When asked, the prime minister has said that we have to “keep it under review”. But keeping things under review isn’t enough. If the English votes are to go ahead, important steps need to be set in motion immediately.

Running an election during a pandemic means making significant changes to the normal routine. Citizens may not want to risk their health and decide not to vote if their safety can’t be assured, so measures need to be taken to ensure their safety.

But many of the English local elections have been postponed once already. At some point, it becomes a question of whether postponing poses a threat to democratic freedoms. Some officials have had an extra year in office as a result of the first delay. These elections matter because they hold politicians to account and allow citizens to shape how public services are run. They will also provide the first litmus test for how the current UK government is performing since the 2019 general election.

2020 elections

Many elections worldwide were postponed in 2020 so England was not alone. Our research with International IDEA shows that between February and December, 75 countries and territories postponed elections for at least a short time. Most were rescheduled very quickly, however.

Italy held a referendum and elections, due in late March, at the height of the first wave, in September. Countries that did not hold or reschedule a postponed election were very troubled political systems such as Somalia. For context, Somalia has not conducted a direct popular vote since 1969.

The UK was unusual in postponing for a whole year. It has already delayed as long as Hong Kong, a postponement that even the Trump administration described as undermining “the democratic processes and freedoms”.

How to host a pandemic election

There have been more than 100 national and local elections that did happen around the world in 2020 and we have found many success stories.

A key takeaway was the importance of enabling postal voting. This facilitates higher turnout and reduces risks to staff and the public. Bavaria showed how elections in which everyone votes by post can be organised with very short notice.

However, it would be difficult to organise all-postal elections for May in England, as administrators have warned. There are rigorous anti-fraud mechanisms in place which would require the electorate to provide their signatures and date of births before being given a postal vote. Only one in five have done so so far.

Only if these mechanisms were relaxed could all-postal elections be feasible for May, which means this isn’t really a serious option. It would, however, be possible with a short delay if everyone could be encouraged to apply for a postal vote since there are no limitations on who can apply.

Urgent measures

There are other best practices that the UK government has been slow to adopt. It needs to act urgently to have them in place.

For a start, voting should be spread over several days. This makes it easier for voters to socially distance in polling stations while giving everyone time to take part. Even local elections, where turnout is low, have peaks and queues during busier moments. Early voting can also encourage higher turnout. There is time for such legislation to be drawn up and introduced. This would improve elections anyway, if the government acts now and is clear about the intentions of such legal changes.

The people running these elections also need more funding so that they can make voting safe. In Australia, polling stations were provided with hand sanitiser and extra staff were laid on so that extra cleaning could be done. In South Korea, temperature checks were taken before citizens entered polling stations. This all took money. The provision of PPE in South Korea was estimated to add $16 million to the cost of running an election in March 2020. Hand sanitiser and other health measures added $32-37 million to the budget for Sri Lankan elections.

Unfortunately, the UK government has not promised additional funds to make the 2021 elections safe. Chloe Smith, the minister for constitution and devolution, apparently envisages no additional funding being made available to local authorities to conduct the 2021 elections. Writing to electoral officials in September, she said only that local authorities had been given £3.7 billion of un-ringfenced funding to deal with coronavirus in general, and that it continued to be local authorities’ responsibility to fund local elections. This is unacceptable. More is needed.

Decision making needs to be open and transparent. We’ve seen examples of authorities holding public hearings about elections during the pandemic. But decisions are being made unrecorded behind closed doors amongst government officials. Groups representing voters with special needs need to be heard in particular so that everyone is included.

COVID-19 is presenting a very changeable situation and the new strain in the UK may cause plans to change. But if the May elections are to go ahead in England, urgent and decisive action is needed immediately.

Authors:

• Toby James, Professor of Politics and Public Policy at the University of East Anglia

• Alistair Clark, Reader in Politics, Newcastle University

Disclosure statement: Toby James' research has been externally funded by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust, British Academy, Leverhulme Trust, AHRC, ESRC, Nuffield Foundation, SSHRC and the McDougall Trust.

Alistair Clark's research has been funded by the ESRC, British Academy, the Leverhulme Trust, and the Nuffield Foundation