Cost effectiveness — providing an effective service at the lowest possible cost — is the major yardstick for sustainability, rather than purely lowest cost. Savings cannot be allowed to compromise the basic requirements of legitimate elections. A particular measure to reduce electoral costs may work well in one country but not in another because of differing legal, political and socio-economic circumstances. Although the practice of having a single-member EMB is a useful cost-saving measure, in India it was rebuffed by the Supreme Court as not conducive to fair decision-making, thus paving the way for the appointment of a three-member EMB in 1993. It is therefore not possible to prescribe commonly applicable sustainability solutions, only general principles. Significant cost savings can be achieved by holding elections for all levels of representation on the same day. However, the marked political effects of having either simultaneous or staggered elections mean that political sustainability arguments may outweigh financial ones.
