Cheating the Machine: E-voting Practices in Kyrgyzstan’s Local Elections

2020 ◽  
Vol 28 (5) ◽  
pp. 793-809
Author(s):  
Arzuu Sheranova
Keyword(s):  
Regional Identity ◽  
City Council ◽  
Biometric Identification ◽  
Local Elections ◽  
Vote Buying ◽  
Voting System ◽  
Democratic Elections ◽  
Group Family ◽  
Vote Counting

This paper analyses the e-voting experience of the local elections undertaken by Osh city Council in 2016. The process was introduced to ensure fair and democratic elections in Kyrgyzstan after continuous and repeated violent political uprising. The e-system, based on biometrics registration, biometric identification of voters and automated vote counting, was designed to help to avoid the most common election frauds: vote buying, carousel voting and group/family voting. The case study, mainly based on interviews, illustrates the adaptation and modernization of strategies to resist and cheat within the e-voting system. The analysis outlines three widely practised cheating strategies: procedural violations, such as avoiding cross-checking of manual and automated counting and allowing voting without biometrical identification; transformation of bribery into ‘vote auctioning’; and strengthening of kinship-based/regional support and tribal/regional identity under conditions of e-voting.

To Participation and Beyond?

2014 ◽  
pp. 215-228
Author(s):  
Paul Burton ◽  
Stephen Hilton
Keyword(s):  
Social Inclusion ◽  
City Council ◽  
Local Elections ◽  
Local Democracy ◽  
Grass Roots ◽  
Government Institutions ◽  
Local Program ◽  
The Times ◽  
The City

This chapter provides a case study of local developments in e-democracy in the city of Bristol, UK. Although some of these developments relate to periodic local elections, most are concerned with supporting new forms of engagement between local citizens and local government institutions and processes in the times between these. Starting with the coordination of its own consultation activities, then encouraging greater participation in council-run activities, and finally supporting grass roots engagement activities, Bristol City Council embarked on a local program of e-democracy activities from 2000 onwards. This grew into a national pilot scheme that enabled a number of valuable comparative evaluations of e-democracy in practice. The chapter draws on the results of a number of evaluations of these local and national developments and highlights the more widespread and enduring challenges of trying to broaden the scope and the effectiveness of local democracy and improve the practices of social inclusion.

To Participation and Beyond?

2015 ◽  
pp. 1662-1675
Author(s):  
Paul Burton ◽  
Stephen Hilton
Keyword(s):  
Social Inclusion ◽  
City Council ◽  
Local Elections ◽  
Local Democracy ◽  
Grass Roots ◽  
Government Institutions ◽  
Local Program ◽  
The Times ◽  
The City

This chapter provides a case study of local developments in e-democracy in the city of Bristol, UK. Although some of these developments relate to periodic local elections, most are concerned with supporting new forms of engagement between local citizens and local government institutions and processes in the times between these. Starting with the coordination of its own consultation activities, then encouraging greater participation in council-run activities, and finally supporting grass roots engagement activities, Bristol City Council embarked on a local program of e-democracy activities from 2000 onwards. This grew into a national pilot scheme that enabled a number of valuable comparative evaluations of e-democracy in practice. The chapter draws on the results of a number of evaluations of these local and national developments and highlights the more widespread and enduring challenges of trying to broaden the scope and the effectiveness of local democracy and improve the practices of social inclusion.

“Three disconnects” and China’s rural election: A case study of Hailian Village

2006 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhaohui Hong
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
The Political ◽  
Local Elections ◽  
Institutional Logic ◽  
Urban Regions ◽  
Democratic Elections

With the case study of the local elections in a poverty-stricken, largely illiterate and isolated village in the remote and mountainous Yi minority village, this article is intended to address the so-called “three disconnects” phenomenon in the development of China’s rural election. They refer to the disconnect between economic development and democratic elections, the disconnect between democratic elections and democratic consciousness, and the disconnect between direct local elections in the rural areas and the higher level elections in urban regions. The article examines the political reasons and institutional logic behind this unique development of rural democracy in China as well as the existential value of the three “disconnects.”

scholarly journals Clientelism and vote buying in local elections: A case study of Kartu Bintan Sejahtera

2018 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 72
Author(s):  
Tri Samnuzulsari ◽  
Wayu Eko Yudiatmaja
Keyword(s):  
Local Politics ◽  
Case Study Research ◽  
Local Elections ◽  
Vote Buying ◽  
Success Story ◽  
Media Campaigns ◽  
Political Networks ◽  
Buying In ◽  
Election Commission

This study finds out clientelism and vote buying on Kartu Bintan Sejahtera (KBS) in Bintan Regency, Riau Islands. The objective of this study is to understand the practices of clientelism and vote buying using KBS. This study based on case study research. The informants consist of General Election Commission of (KPUD) Riau Islands, candidates of the governor of Riau Islands 2015-2020, candidates of Bintan Regent 2015-2020, along with their supporting parties and campaigning team, and bureaucracy of the implementation of KBS. The main findings of this study suggest that KBS is used as a clientelism and vote buying practices by the candidate of Riau Islands governor and Bintan Regent, 2015-2020 period. This study also finds that formal and informal political networks are utilized by the candidates as a clientelism and vote buying arenas. This study not only contributes to the literature of clientelism and vote buying, but also adds the literature of social policy in the context of Indonesian local politics setting. This study suggests that KBS is used as a media to obtain the support of the voters in the election of governor of Riau Islands and regent of Bintan 2015-2020. All candidates capitalize the issue of KBS to obtain the popularity. The patterns of the practice of clientelism and vote buying in KBS is by using various media campaigns to promote the success story of KBS. Not only in formal campaign but also in informal campaign, they always promote KBS as their success.

scholarly journals Citizen Participation and Machine Learning for a Better Democracy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Procter ◽  
Miguel Arana-Catania ◽  
Felix-Anselm van Lier ◽  
Nataliya Tkachenko ◽  
Yulan He ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Information Overload ◽  
City Council ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Development Goals ◽  
Democratic Systems ◽  
The City

The development of democratic systems is a crucial task as confirmed by its selection as one of the Millennium Sustainable Development Goals by the United Nations. In this article, we report on the progress of a project that aims to address barriers, one of which is information overload, to achieving effective direct citizen participation in democratic decision-making processes. The main objectives are to explore if the application of Natural Language Processing (NLP) and machine learning can improve citizens? experience of digital citizen participation platforms. Taking as a case study the ?Decide Madrid? Consul platform, which enables citizens to post proposals for policies they would like to see adopted by the city council, we used NLP and machine learning to provide new ways to (a) suggest to citizens proposals they might wish to support; (b) group citizens by interests so that they can more easily interact with each other; (c) summarise comments posted in response to proposals; (d) assist citizens in aggregating and developing proposals. Evaluation of the results confirms that NLP and machine learning have a role to play in addressing some of the barriers users of platforms such as Consul currently experience.

Minimalinvasiv oder wirksam? Debattenbeitrag zur Novellierung des Bundeswahlrechts vom Oktober 2020

2021 ◽  
Vol 52 (3) ◽  
pp. 675-684
Author(s):  
Johannes Krause
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Electoral System ◽  
Vote System ◽  
The Political ◽  
Local Elections ◽  
Standard Size ◽  
National Parliament ◽  
System P ◽  
Voting System ◽  
The Way

Despite the 2020 reform of Germany’s national parliament voting law, the debate about a robust voting system has not ended . Träger and Jacobs have convincingly shown that Naun­dorf’s suggestion to introduce a parallel voting system creates more problems than it solves, and thus more far-reaching approaches have to be considered . One way to stop the Bunde­stag from growing is to reject the two vote-system . Comparable to the system of Thuringia’s local elections, with open lists and three votes per voter, both the standard size of the Bun­destag can be safely adhered to and at the same time a personalized proportional represen­tation can be maintained . Among other advantages, the voters would have greater influence on the personalized composition of the Bundestag . In particular, reservations on the part of the political parties could stand in the way of such a sustainable solution to the ongoing problems with the German electoral system .

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