In the past few years, issues related to the political rights of international migrants in general, and those of migrant workers in particular, have begun to acquire relevance on the academic agenda as well as the international political agenda. This development has already been translated into the adoption of various international legal instruments that specifically provide for this type of right, as indicated by the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families.
Although the debate and regulations on external voting are not necessarily related specifically to the questions of migrant workers’ political rights, there is no doubt that the concurrence of the globalization and democratization processes at the same time as international migration is growing is creating a clear demand for the full recognition of their political rights in many developing countries. The most general and visible expression of this demand is the guarantee of their right to vote. Through the exercise of this right, migrant workers seek not only to maintain or reinforce their sense of belonging to their original national political community but also to redefine the terms of their relations with the country they feel to be their own.
The design and instrumentation of mechanisms for external voting in countries which have large numbers of migrant workers abroad can face three fundamental challenges.
First, the category of migrant worker is difficult to translate into a mechanism for external voting. Above all, how reasonable or feasible is it to isolate or privilege the migrant worker category over other categories of migrants? If it is reasonable or feasible, how can migrant workers be distinguished or identified in a legal and procedural way within the whole community of migrants abroad? In contrast to mechanisms that may be specifically designed for a certain type of voter or resident abroad (e.g. only those carrying out official duties, students or refugees), there is unlikely to be strong support for distinguishing migrant workers from other kinds of potential voters.
The second great challenge is that international migration for work is often a large-scale phenomenon that exhibits diverse geographical distribution patterns, that is, it regularly involves thousands of persons (potential voters) distributed according to heterogeneous patterns (sometimes concentrated, sometimes dispersed) not only across one or several countries of destination but also within every one of them. This means that we must make a careful assessment of the most suitable options for registering them and conducting the voting, as well as running electoral information campaigns. This assessment must take into account not only the advantages and disadvantages offered by the different models but also, and fundamentally, the administrative and financial capacities of the country or the electoral authority involved.
The third challenge lies in making the electoral regulations and procedures more flexible, and innovating or adjusting them, in order to genuinely and positively include migrant workers. On this subject, it is important to keep in mind that the regulation and control of campaign activities and the administration of electoral justice are usually very sensitive topics in developing democracies, while the opportunity to duplicate abroad certain characteristic guarantees or attributes of the domestic system will be limited. Clearly, without full confidence in the accountability and impartiality of the domestic electoral system it will be very difficult to accept adjustments or innovations abroad since as a general rule the mechanisms of control and security are likely to be weaker for the external vote.
In favourable conditions, the creation of an external voting mechanism that seeks to include migrant workers can present a good opportunity to introduce interesting innovations to several components of the electoral system, and even to try out different methods of voter registration, as well as different procedures for the conduct of the actual voting. Under adverse conditions, however, the design of the mechanism could be problematic for all those involved, and especially for the authorities responsible for organizing, conducting and overseeing elections. In any case, even if the mechanism for external voting is sufficiently flexible and well-intentioned in trying to include migrant workers overseas, the migrants’ juridical, socio-economic, political and cultural conditions are likely to work against the initial intentions and expectations.
One conclusion that can be drawn at this point is that any mechanism for external voting entails a range of alternatives and variants which can be adapted to specific conditions and requirements. A universe of potential voters abroad made up mainly of migrant workers presents a series of challenges and complexities that can be addressed by a limited set of options. It is clear that from a conceptual and legal point of view it is neither possible nor desirable to design an external voting mechanism that is aimed exclusively at migrant workers, but it is also true that the legal and procedural options chosen regarding a set of basic aspects of the characteristics and reach of an external voting mechanism (Who is eligible to vote? What are the requirements and procedures for registration and voting?) will largely determine its ability to effectively include migrant workers.
