Some electoral legal frameworks specify that EMB members should be partly drawn from independent technocrats - such as judges, academics, civil society representatives and career public servants - and partly from appointments by political parties. This may combine advantages from both models, producing even-handed bodies that have both political party buy-in and transparency in their operations.

This ‘combined’ model can be implemented in various ways. In Croatia, a standing EMB formed from five members of the legal profession is augmented for election periods by three members of each of the majority and opposition blocs in the legislature, all with equal voting rights. Thus, only if opposing political tendencies agree can the independent members be outvoted. In Hungary, the chair and four members of the National EMB are elected by the legislature, and the political parties participating in the elections delegate one member each. The elected and delegated members have equal rights. Decisions of the EMB are made by simple majority, and decisions may be appealed to a court. In Mexico, the EMB is a permanent body comprising eight expert members plus a representative of each political group in the legislature and of each national political party. However, in the Mexican case, the legislators and party representatives are non-voting members.

Similarly to multiparty EMBs, ‘combined’ EMBs can find decision-making difficult. For example, in the 1999, Indonesian elections the ‘combined’ EMB was unable to validate the election results because members representing some very minor political parties refused to sign off on the validation unless their parties were allocated seats to which they were not entitled by their votes. This has been the rationale in some cases for making the party representatives non-voting members of their respective EMBs.

For a comparative table on advantages and disadvantages of multiparty, expert and ‘combined’ EMBs, see “Advantages and Disadvantages of Multiparty, Expert, and Combined EMBs” on the right hand side bar.