Hidden in plain sight? Irregularities on statutory forms and electoral fraud

The contemporary era raises a series of red flags about electoral integrity in America. Problems include plummeting public trust, exacerbated by President Trump’s claims of massive electoral fraud. Confidence in the impartiality and reliability of information from the news media has eroded. And Russian meddling has astutely exploited both these vulnerabilities, heightening fears that the 2016 contest was unfair. This book brings together a first-class group of expert academics and practitioners to analyze challenges facing contemporary elections in America. Contributors analyze evidence for a series of contemporary challenges facing American elections, including the weaknesses of electoral laws, overly restrictive electoral registers, gerrymandering district boundaries, fake news, the lack of transparency, and the hodgepodge of inconsistent state regulations. The conclusion sets these issues in comparative context and draws out the broader policy lessons for improving electoral integrity and strengthening democracy.

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ELECTORAL FRAUD DURING INDIRECT AND PUBLIC ELECTIONS, 1901–12

Stuffing the Ballot Box ◽

10.1017/cbo9780511510250.003 ◽

2002 ◽

pp. 34-62

Keyword(s):

Electoral Fraud

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Reevaluating the Middle-Class Protest Paradigm: A Case-Control Study of Democratic Protest Coalitions in Russia

American Political Science Review ◽

10.1017/s000305541700034x ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 111 (4) ◽

pp. 637-652 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

BRYN ROSENFELD

Keyword(s):

Middle Class ◽

Population Data ◽

Case Control ◽

Democratic Transitions ◽

Electoral Fraud ◽

New Approach ◽

Middle Classes ◽

State Sector ◽

State Dependent ◽

Selective Incentives

A large literature expects rising middle classes to promote democracy. However, few studies provide direct evidence on this group in nondemocratic settings. This article focuses on politically important differentiation within the middle classes, arguing that middle-class growth in state-dependent sectors weakens potential coalitions in support of democratization. I test this argument using surveys conducted at mass demonstrations in Russia and detailed population data. I also present a new approach to studying protest based on case-control methods from epidemiology. The results reveal that state-sector professionals were significantly less likely to mobilize against electoral fraud, even after controlling for ideology. If this group had participated at the same rate as middle-class professionals from the private sector, I estimate that another 90,000 protesters would have taken to the streets. I trace these patterns of participation to the interaction of individual resources and selective incentives. These findings have implications for authoritarian stability and democratic transitions.

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Electoral Manipulation and Regime Support

World Politics ◽

10.1017/s0043887120000234 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-40 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Ora John Reuter ◽

David Szakonyi

Keyword(s):

Survey Experiment ◽

Authoritarian Rule ◽

Electoral Fraud ◽

Electoral Support ◽

Ex Ante ◽

Regime Support ◽

Core Base ◽

Ruling Party

ABSTRACT Does electoral fraud stabilize authoritarian rule or undermine it? The answer to this question rests in part on how voters evaluate regime candidates who engage in fraud. Using a survey experiment conducted after the 2016 elections in Russia, the authors find that voters withdraw their support from ruling party candidates who commit electoral fraud. This effect is especially large among strong supporters of the regime. Core regime supporters are more likely to have ex ante beliefs that elections are free and fair. Revealing that fraud has occurred significantly reduces their propensity to support the regime. The authors’ findings illustrate that fraud is costly for autocrats not just because it may ignite protest, but also because it can undermine the regime’s core base of electoral support. Because many of its strongest supporters expect free and fair elections, the regime has strong incentives to conceal or otherwise limit its use of electoral fraud.

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Electronic Voting and Credible Election in Nigeria: A Study of Owerri Senatorial Zone

Journal of Management and Strategy ◽

10.5430/jms.v9n3p30 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 9 (3) ◽

pp. 30 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Nnaeto Japhet Olusadum ◽

Ndoh Juliet Anulika

Keyword(s):

Data Analysis ◽

Computer Technology ◽

Electronic Voting ◽

Electoral Fraud ◽

Information And Computer Technology ◽

The Subject ◽

Election Fraud ◽

Legal Frameworks ◽

Physically Challenged ◽

Structured Questionnaire

The study is basically to examine electronic-voting in Nigeria elections as an improvement on the traditional paper voting with a focus on Owerri Senatorial Zone, Imo State. Worried by the frequent and debilitating incidences of electoral fraud and disenfranchisement of voters for unsubstantiated reasons, the study tended to sample opinion of respondents in Owerri on the subject as a way of strengthening democracy. Martin Hagen theory of e-democracy was adopted as theoretical framework. Hagen construes e-democracy as a strategic tool to strengthen democratic practices using the information and computer technology (ICT). The study is a survey attempt which made use of structured questionnaire to elicit information from respondents. Simple per centage was used for data analysis. It is our finding among others that e-voting will reduce incidences of election fraud especially in the areas of voting and counting of votes, and also the physically challenged qualified voters and citizens living and working abroad will have opportunity to cast their votes. The study concludes that Nigeria must cash in on flourishing (ICT) to fight endemic electoral irregularities in Nigeria through firm belief in and avowed adoption of e-voting. The study recommended among others institutionalization of legal frameworks and structures that will formidably support the practice of e-voting in Owerri senatorial zone in particular and Nigeria in general.

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The Predicament of Europe’s ‘Last Dictator’

International Area Studies Review ◽

10.1177/22338659211018326 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 223386592110183

Author(s):

Yuliya Brel-Fournier ◽

Minion K.C. Morrison

Keyword(s):

Social Contract ◽

Presidential Election ◽

Status Quo ◽

Political Crisis ◽

Modern History ◽

Electoral Fraud ◽

The Future ◽

The Status ◽

History Of

Belarusian citizens elected their first president in 1994. More than 20 years later, in October 2015, the same person triumphantly won the fifth consecutive presidential election. In August 2020, President Lukashenko’s attempt to get re-elected for the sixth time ended in months’ long mass protests against the electoral fraud, unspeakable violence used by the riot police against peaceful protesters and the deepest political crisis in the modern history of Belarus. This article analyzes how and why the first democratically elected Belarusian president attained this long-serving status. It suggests that his political longevity was conditioned by a specific social contract with the society that was sustained for many years. In light of the recent events, it is obvious that the contract is breached with the regime no longer living up to the bargain with the Belarusian people. As a result, the citizens seem unwilling to maintain their obligation for loyalty. We analyze the escalating daily price for maintaining the status quo and conclude considering the possible implications of this broken pact for the future of Belarus.

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Design and development of biometric voting system using fingerprint and facial recognition

Nigerian Journal of Technological Research ◽

10.4314/njtr.v15i3.5 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 15 (3) ◽

pp. 34-43

Author(s):

A. Okandeji ◽

M.B. Olajide ◽

A.A. Okubanjo ◽

F. Onaifo

Keyword(s):

Facial Recognition ◽

Cost Effective ◽

Electoral Process ◽

Viable Option ◽

Electoral Fraud ◽

Audio Processing ◽

Security Breaches ◽

Election Process ◽

Distorted Version ◽

Voting System

The election process adopted in Nigeria is mostly paper based or manual. This manually handled process can be time-consuming, and prone to security breaches and electoral fraud. Consequently, this work proposes a biometrically authenticated voting system to provide inexpensive solution to the electoral process in Nigeria. In particular, the biometric database is constructed by filling it with the audio fingerprints and the associated metadata of many audio clips, and then the fingerprint of an unknown clip (or the distorted version of the clip brought by compression or standard audio processing) is extracted and compared to that of the clip in the database. If the fingerprint of the unknown clip is in the database, it will be correctly identified by the matching procedures. The project is implemented with biometric system i.e. fingerprint scanning and facial recognition. Accordingly, this is used to ensure enhanced security, and to avoid fake, repeated voting. Results obtained showed that the proposed system is fast, accurate, reliable, and cost effective, thus a viable option to replace the manual voting process. Keywords: Biometrics, electoral process, facial recognition, finger print scanning

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