Voter registration involves various stakeholders. The most obvious are citizens and the government’s election administration apparatus. But others as well have an interest in the outcome of the voter registration process since it may affect an election outcome. These stakeholders include the government, the military, political parties, interest groups, social and religious institutions, foreign governments, and international organisations.
Political Parties and Voter Registration
Political parties have a strong interest in voter registration because the system used may directly affect the amount of support they obtain. One well-recognised strategy for winning an election is to control who turns out at the polls: through encouraging or discouraging registration by voters or groups of voters, a party may improve its chances. The three key performance criteria for a voters’ list are currency, accuracy and completeness. Sometimes the election management authority may have difficulty meeting performance targets because political parties see it as in their interest to limit the size of the electorate or exclude certain types of voters for example, people from certain regions, or certain ethnic or linguistic groups. If the party attempting to interfere with voter registration is the ruling party, the challenge for the election management authority is even greater. Of course not all parties seek to influence the character of the voters’ list, but electoral administrators must be mindful of the possibility that some will.
Political parties have a more particular interest in the voter registration process. Election management authorities have an interest in political parties, for the following reasons:
- Political parties generally use the voters’ list (often the preliminary list) for campaign purposes. The list enables parties to contact voters directly through door-to-door campaigning or by mail;
- Party spending is sometimes based on the number of voters on the voters’ list. This number may be used to limit the amount of money that the party or a local candidate is allowed to spend in a campaign. The number of voters on the list thus may have a direct bearing on the type of campaign a party or candidate is able to conduct;
- If election management authorities conduct door-to-door registration, with the consequent spike in activity during voter registration, they often rely on parties to provide names of people who can serve as registration officers.. Since voter registration must be, and be perceived as, non-partisan, registration officers with ties to political parties generally work in pairs, with each of the two nominated by a different party;and
- Parties often play a critical role, implicitly or explicitly, by endorsing the voter registration process. In doing so they confer legitimacy on the election itself. For legitimacy purposes, it is important that political parties be given sufficient oversight of voter registration, and that registration be conducted fairly and transparently.
Foreign Interests
Foreign governments, foreign non-governmental organisations and international organisations make an important contribution by providing assistance in democratic election administration, and by supplying international election observation personnel and services. Their stamp of approval may do much to ensure that an election is viewed as a legitimate and definitive statement of the will of the people.
National Interests
Domestic stakeholders other than political parties may feel they have a greater interest than international observers in the election process and outcome, and rightly so. At issue is control of the government. Some stakeholders may be tempted to become directly involved in the campaign instead of providing oversight and helping promote the legitimacy of the process.
Wherever possible, it is best to encourage all national stakeholders to work for development of fair and impartial election administration machinery and practices. The international community may advocate on behalf of this approach, with the assistance of international election observers. They can help convince national stakeholders of the wisdom of focusing on implementation of fair and impartial practices. Citizen election monitors today play a growing role, often working with international observers to provide election oversight and safeguard legitimacy.
