The complexity and specialist skills necessary for electoral management requires that an institution or institutions be formed to be responsible for electoral activities. Such bodies have a variety of shapes and sizes, with a wide range of titles to match, which include ‘Election Commission’, ‘Department of Elections’, ‘Electoral Council’, ‘Election Unit’, or ‘Electoral Board’. The term ‘electoral management body’ or EMB has been coined as a name to refer to the body or bodies responsible for electoral management whatever wider institutional framework is in place.

An EMB is an organisation or body which has been founded for the purpose of, and is legally responsible for, managing one or more of the elements that are essential for the conduct of elections, and of direct democracy instruments – such as referendums, citizens’ initiatives, and recall votes – if those are part of the legal framework.

These essential elements include:

• determining who is eligible to vote;
• receiving and validating the nominations of electoral
• participants (for elections, political parties and/or candidates);
• conducting balloting;
• counting votes; and
• totalling votes from polling locations.

If these essential elements are allocated to various bodies, then all bodies which have a share of these essential elements can be considered as EMBs. An EMB may be a stand-alone institution, or a distinct management unit within a larger institution which may also have non-electoral tasks.

In addition to these essential elements, an EMB may undertake other tasks which assist the conduct of elections and direct democracy instruments, such as:

• conduct of voter registration;
• boundary delimitation;
• procurement of electoral materials;
• voter education;
• management or oversight of campaign financing;
• media monitoring; and
• electoral dispute resolution.

However, a body which has no electoral responsibilities other than, for example, boundary delimitation (such as a boundary delimitation commission), electoral dispute resolution (such as an electoral court), election media monitoring (such as a media monitoring commission) or the conduct of voter education (such as a civic education commission) is not an EMB as such because it is not managing any of the ‘essential elements’ of elections as identified above. Similarly, a state population or statistics bureau which produces electoral registers as part of the general process of population registration is not considered to be an EMB.

Some bodies not engaged in any of the ‘essential elements’ of elections may be popularly regarded as EMBs due to the breadth of election-related activities which they undertake. An example is the New Zealand Electoral Commission, which is responsible for party registration, the allocation of broadcasting time and official funds to parties, oversight of party funding and expenditure, and voter education. However, such institutions do not qualify as EMBs under the definition of an EMB above.

In addition to the division of functional responsibility for different elements of the electoral process, electoral responsibilities may be divided between bodies at different levels. For example, some elements of the conduct of elections may be managed by a national-level Electoral Commission, a ministry (such as the Interior Ministry), or a national government agency, while others are implemented by local-level commissions, regional branches of government departments, or local authorities. The term ‘EMB’ may also apply to a national Electoral Commission which co-manages elections with local authorities, and can include in its functions things such as the coordination of ballot paper printing, and the distribution of seats and announcement of results at the national level.