Voter registration is an important, and often very expensive, part of an election. Also, it is
one of the areas of the electoral cycle where the influence and the application of ICTs are
growing the most.
Voter registration establishes the eligibility of individuals to cast a ballot. As one of the
more costly, time-consuming and complex aspects of the electoral process, it often
accounts for a considerable portion of the budget, staff time and resources of an election
authority. If conducted well, voter registration can confer legitimacy on the process. A
flawed voter registry, on the other hand, complicates electoral planning and removes an
important safeguard against fraud.
A voters list makes it possible to separate two of the most important functions of the
election authority: verifying voter eligibility and controlling the legitimacy of the balloting
process. The list may also be used in voter education, and may be provided to political
parties and candidates to aid them in their campaigns. While elections may proceed
without it, a voters list offers advantages that readily justify its use.
By confirming that voters have met all eligibility requirements, the voters list helps confer
legitimacy on the electoral process. Conversely, the legitimacy of the process will immediately
be called into question if there are problems with voter registration, and particularly with
the integrity of the voters list. Voter registration therefore is one of the most important tasks
of election administration and there are three options to implement it:
- a periodic list
- a continuous register or list
- a voter list drawn from the civil registry
The election authority must choose one of these, or a combination, as the basis on which
to design a voter registration system.
Periodic List
A periodic register of voters, or a “periodic list,” is established for a specific electoral event, and
electoral administrators do not necessarily intend to maintain or update the list for future
use (although it may be used for by-elections in the period of time after its compilation
and before the next occasion a periodic list is compiled). Normally the list is drawn up
immediately before the election, although this need not be the case. This system is relatively
expensive and time-consuming since it requires direct contact with all eligible voters before
the election. It may be particularly useful where the infrastructure is lacking to maintain
a continuous list, where population mobility is high or where there is opposition to the
maintenance of lists of citizens by the government. The periodic list may also be preferred
by quasi-governmental agencies, such as electoral management bodies or commissions,
particularly as a periodic list is often “owned” by the EMB as the agency that compiles it.
Continuous List
A continuous list of voters is a list that is maintained and regularly updated by the electoral
administration. This system depends on an appropriate infrastructure to maintain the
list. Maintenance typically involves adding the names and other relevant information
of new people that satisfy the eligibility requirements (e.g. those reaching the voting
age, naturalised citizens, etc.), deleting the names of those who no longer meet the
requirements (e.g. through death), and altering the details of those voters whose recorded
data in the voters list requires updating (e.g. through name change form marriage or
change of residence). Since the continuous list is updated on a regular basis there is no
need for a full or final registration drive immediately before an election (although a period
is often designated for revising the list during the election campaign). A continuous list
may be maintained either locally or nationally.
To facilitate list updates, many election authorities form data-sharing partnerships with
other government bodies. For example, when citizens change their place of residence,
they may inform the tax bureau, the post office, the housing authority or the health system.
In many countries with a continuous register, partnerships allow the election authority to
receive regular updates of changes to these bodies’ files. This makes it possible to update
the electoral register without any direct contact between the voter and the election
authority. In some cases, on learning about a change of address, the election authority
may send the voter a new voter registration card with a request to update and confirm the
information that appears on it.
Voter List drawn from the Civil Registry
A third option for registering voters is to generate the voter list from the civil registry.
Civil registries are maintained, to various degrees, in many countries. Civil registries may
contain a variety of information on all citizens, such as name, address, citizenship, age,
marital status and identification number. In certain countries, particularly in Europe and
Latin America, the voters list is produced from information contained in the national civil
registry. In countries with a civil registry, a central question, as it pertains to elections,
is whether the body responsible for maintaining the civil registry (often the interior
ministry) should be responsible for the voters list. Some countries give the same institution
responsibility for both registries; others choose two agencies, each with responsibility for
one of the lists.
If a civil registry is in place, producing a voters list from it is relatively efficient and costeffective.
This is because the major costs are borne in the first place by the civil registry
authorities. And while it is relatively expensive to maintain a civil registry, the information
recorded may be used for multiple purposes, reducing the government’s overall data
management costs.
The major drawback of the system is its major strength. Even though the high cost may
be justified, data sharing among government institutions may give rise to controversy.
Concerns may be expressed about the loss, or potential loss, of privacy, particularly if the
government decides to add additional data fields, or merge the registry with, for example,
the tax authority’s database. If the concerns are widespread, a civil registry may be simply
unacceptable despite its usefulness.
