Monitoring of the entire electoral process is one of the integrity safeguards that help protect the viability and honesty of election administration, as well as fair participation by election participants.

Monitoring promotes compliance with the legal framework and helps deter questionable activities. Public reporting by monitors increases transparency and helps ensure election officers’ accountability.

Monitoring includes official oversight by a government auditor or agency, as well as observation of the process by political parties, the media and individual electors, as well as national NGOs and international groups.

Monitoring may be partisan (conducted by political parties) or non-partisan (conducted by accredited national or international observers). Partisan monitoring focuses on protecting the interests of a particular candidate or party. For this reason, it is important to have participation by monitors from different political parties active throughout the process.

Non-partisan monitoring is expected to be impartial and objective. Since reporting on elections usually involves forming an opinion about the quality of the process, integrity in monitoring is itself important. Integrity issues related to monitoring are discussed in this section.

To be effective, monitoring should cover the entire electoral process, not just some aspects such as voter registration or polling. Among other things, monitors must examine:

• the scope and effectiveness of the legal framework;
• the appropriateness of electoral procedures and preparations, including training of election staff;
• delimitation of electoral districts;
• elector registration;
• information and education programs;
• registration of political parties and candidates;
• freedom of association, assembly and movement;
• freedom from fear and intimidation;
• freedom of expression and equal access to the media;
• use of public resources for campaign purposes;
• activities on election day;
• vote counting and consolidation of results; and
• the adequacy of procedures for lodging complaints about election conduct and results, and procedures for resolving them.[1]

Declaration of Global Principles for Non-Partisan Election Observation and Monitoring by Citizen Organizations

An important milestone in the progress of independent election monitoring and observation was development of the Declaration of Global Principles for Non-Partisan Election Observation And Monitoring by Citizen Organizations and Code of Conduct for Non-Partisan Citizen Election Observers and Monitors, initiated by the Global Network of Domestic Election Monitors (GNDEM).  Conclusion of the Declaration and Code of Conduct was commemorated at the UN during 2012, by which time scores of citizen networks, international supporters and NGOs had endorsed the document.[2]