Original question

This question was posed by Jerome Leyraud who is a member of the Practitioners' Network. To view his profile, please click the "Members of the Practitioners' Network" link to the left of the Workspace page.

In line with international standards and the regional forum’s recommendations to outlaw and eliminate family voting, UNDP Macedonia is planning to launch a project aimed at raising public awareness on vote secrecy accentuating that proxy and family voting is a strong violation of electoral rights. In this regard, the project strategy includes lobbying political forces to place proxy and family voting on the political agenda, working with national counterparts (in particular the election authorities) to address women’s disenfranchisement and finally conducting a public awareness campaign, in collaboration with civil society organizations, to help eradicate personal and secret vote violations while promoting women’s participation to political life, with special emphasis on marginalized and vulnerable social groups.

I led a quick assessment/project formulation mission in Skopje on behalf of UNDP. But in view of collecting comparative analysis, the team would appreciate receiving further information on similar electoral malpractices witnessed elsewhere. In particular we are wondering if colleagues, when working with elections in other parts of the world, have already faced similar problems of group/family voting? How did they tackle the matter, provided that regulation prohibiting proxy-family voting is not enforced?

Introduction

The term proxy voting is described in an ACE Encyclopaedia article by Alan Wall and Louise Olivier. In some countries (such as the UK or the Netherlands), the provision for proxy voting allows eligible voters who fulfil certain qualifications to assign a fellow voter (proxy voter) to cast their vote. The voter might be unable to vote due to infirmity, employment requirements or other issues obstructing him/her from being at the voting location on election day.

Related to proxy voting is family voting which, according to Jerome Leyraud, in a Macedonian context refers to the practice of (male) heads of family influencing other family members, in particular women, in the course of voting. Leyraud identifies three types of family voting:

• - A male family member accompanying one or more women relatives into a polling booth
• - Family groups voting together in the open
• - A male family member obtaining ballot papers on behalf of other family members and marking them as he sees fit

Leyraud states that family voting has been occurring in newly-democratizing Central and Eastern European countries since the early 1990s. In these countries, constitutional and legal measures to combat this practice by enforcing equality, the right to vote and the secrecy of the vote has not always been fully implemented. In Macedonia, family voting is threatening women’s effective participation in the political process – a severe problem that has been recognised by several OSCE/ODIHR election observation reports on Macedonia. In the ethnic-centered Macedonian society, various political forces have drawn on proxy and family voting to ensure electoral support among specific ethnic groups. As a consequence, family and proxy voting is closely related to the political context of the country.

Summary of responses

Posted on 12 February, 2009

Although possibly misused in the Macedonian context, Carl Dundas points out that the use of proxy voting in itself does not necessarily entail a fraudulent voting process – used in combination with adequate safeguards, proxy voting can prove to be a useful tool in enhancing electoral services to voters.

This distinction is also made by Antonio Spinelli who states the countries of UK and the Netherlands as examples where proxy voting is used to enfranchise voters who cannot vote on election day. In an attempt to distinguish between terms, Spinelli also suggests the possibility of bona fide family voting, for example when an illiterate, disabled or elderly voter is assisted at the polling station by his/her spouse but still making his/her free, individual choice.

As pointed out by Spinelli, the benign types of family voting are a somewhat rare occurrence that could easily be facilitated by regulation. However, malicious family voting – that is, when the voting decision of an individual voter is unjustly influenced by another family member – poses a serious threat to the credibility of the whole electoral process.  

What causes malicious family voting to occur?

The responses from the Practitioners reveal various grounds for the occurrences of (malicious) family voting. These causes can be divided into three subcategories:

Non- existent or inadequate safeguards

The perhaps most straightforward reason for the occurrence of family voting would be the existence of a weakly designed legislative framework with non-existent and/or inadequate safeguards to prevent family voting. Not only lack of regulations regarding the voting procedure (for example to protect the secrecy of the vote), but also weak provisions to enforce sanctions against violators of the regulations in place, could prove to be a breeding ground for family voting.

Inefficient implementation

Although adequate safeguards and relevant regulations are vital requirements to discourage family voting, Spinelli suggest that these safeguards are only as effective as the election officials and polling workers implementing them. In other words; an election will risk being subject to malicious family voting if election officials do little to implement the regulations in place. The professionalism of polling workers is a vital asset in this aspect.

Angela Bargellini adds that even though cultural and educational obstacles are evident, the root cause to the Macedonian problem is the loose implementation of existing legislation. This implementation is performed not only by electoral management bodies and polling workers but also by all stakeholders involved in the electoral process, such as political parties.

The cultural context

According to Carl Dundas, family voting normally takes place in a context where the family head traditionally possess the legal and/or customary right to take important decisions on behalf of the family. This decision power of the family head might be further strengthened by a lack of knowledge about the principles of elections (the freedom of choice and the secrecy of the vote) among the vulnerable segments of the population, as suggested by Spinelli. Bargellini adds that the Macedonian culture entails a climate of impunity for electoral malpractices such as family voting. Such a climate is likely to negatively affect the implementation and effectiveness of any legislative measures that is taken to combat family voting.

Spinelli also notes that malicious family voting might not always be visible at the polling booths; a voter can easily be subject to unjust influence exercised by the head of family if he/she does not believe in or does not know his/her fundamental voting rights.

How to combat family voting?

There are various solutions on how to battle family voting, and it is good practice to combine the different measures; thus creating legal and procedural safeguards, enabling effective implementation of these safeguards and eradicating cultural obstacles by the provision of information and education to voters.

Creating legal and procedural safeguards

According to Dundas, Spinelli and others, the introduction of certain legislative measures to enhance the secrecy and inviolability of the vote could effectively combat family voting, preferably when combined with rigorous information campaigns. The perhaps simplest form of regulation would be to require each qualified voter to be personally responsible for their own registration and voting and to only allow one voter at the time in the voting compartment. Easily enforceable sanctions would be imposed on any individual violating the rules or tries to influence the decision of another voter. Other suggestions put forward by Debashis Sen includes the introduction of separate polling booths (or separate queues) for men and women, the requirement of photo ID when voting and the automatic cancellation of the vote if the secrecy of voting is violated.

Enabling effective implementation

To prevent an ineffective implementation of the legislative framework designed to battle family voting, Angela Bargellini and Antonio Spinelli recommend extensive training and capacity building exercises aimed at electoral officials and polling workers to increase their professionalism. Such activities are likely to enable polling workers to enforce any regulations designed to prevent family voting directly at the polling station. The task of the polling workers might also be facilitated by displaying clear messages about the rules and regulations of the voting process on posters and/or stickers at the polling station. Such information can also be used by polling workers to justify the enforcement of rules and regulations.

It is good practice to include not only electoral staff but also other important actors such as political parties in the training and capacity building process. According to Bargellini, any initiative to prevent family voting must involve the view that political parties are accountable and responsible actors in the process. Spinelli states that it is also important to develop a system of clear and enforceable sanctions aimed at actors that fails – may it be by incompetence or unethical behaviour – to prevent family voting to occur.

Another suggestion is put forward by Domenico Tuccinardi who states the concern that although many of the above suggestions are valuable, they are likely to be employed only in a short-term perspective, mainly due to the high costs involved. Tuccinardi raises the question of whether such short-term measures will be sufficient to eradicate the issue of family voting in the long run. As an alternative measure, Tuccinardi propose that where clear-cut cases of unregulated family voting have been detected, not only would election officials be punished but the results of the entire polling station annulled. 

This suggestion is however disputed by Spinelli, who states that although regulatory frameworks with clear and easily enforceable sanctions are generally effective, the advantages gained by such a strong measure might be outweighed by the drawbacks. Since the phenomenon of family voting is widespread in Macedonia, the annulment of polling station results when unregulated family voting is documented would heavily affect the overall result of the elections and create incentives for other electoral malpractices and frauds.

Voter education

To combat the cultural obstacles referred above, Spinelli and Bargellini suggests public outreach and voter education campaigns targeting vulnerable voters who might risk being subject to family voting. The message of these campaigns would touch upon the citizens’ freedom of choice and the secrecy of the vote as well as strongly condemning family voting and other electoral malpractice.

Replies were received, with thanks, from:

Carl Dundas

Debashis Sen

Antonio Spinelli

Jerome Leyraud

Angela Bargellini

Domenico Tuccinardi

Links to the ACE Encyclopaedia and other related resources:

On Proxy Voting

ACE Encyclopaedia:     Proxy Voting

Electoral Materials:     United Kingdom: Application to vote by Proxy

iKNOWpolitics:            Consolidated response on the prevention of family voting

On related topics

ACE Encyclopaedia:     Voting Procedures

ACE Encyclopaedia:     Early Voting

ACE Encyclopaedia:     Absentee Voting

On Macedonia

ACE Region & Countries:    Macedonia, former Yugoslav Republic of

Electoral Commission:       Macedonia, former Yugoslav Republic of

Article on Macedonia:        Observer mission cites flaws in Macedonia vote, International Herald Tribune (2005)

Individual Answers:

Jerome,

Proxy voting is used in many electoral legislative schemes to facilitate and improve the quality of electoral services offered to voters. In other words, the inspiration behind proxy voting is often rooted in offering better quality polling services to voters. With adequate inbuilt safeguards, such legislative schemes have been shown to operate well to the benefit of voters and other stakeholders. Where, however, the safeguards are inadequate or non-existent, the implementation of the resultant proxy regime could lead to rapid discredit not only of the regime, but also of the polling process, as happened in Guyana in the 1970s. Even in the United Kingdom where the safeguards in proxy regime were reasonably good, significant irregularities have been found, from time to time, with respect to proxy voting. In short, any proxy regime must be properly regulated to protect the operation of the regime from fraudulent practices.

Family voting or unregulated family proxy voting is commonly practised in jurisdictions that have a tradition of an extended and or customary family rules which allow the dominant member of the family to take important decisions or carry out important activities affecting the family. The simplest and perhaps the surest way to reduce the practice is through legislation requiring each qualified to be responsible for their registration and voting in person. Any such legislation is important to create the environment for personal involvement, but will not in itself eradicate the practice, except with rigorous public awareness programmes embracing all relevant stakeholders.

I quite agree with Carl: there must be a law to maintain secrecy of voting and to prevent impersonation.

A few suggestions to help implement the rules:-

1. Separate polling booths, or at least separate queues, for men and women.

2. No voting without Photo-IDs.

3. Automatic cancellation of vote of anyone violates secrecy of polling.

I must say that, as usual, you raise interesting and thought provoking questions, Jerome. I just wanted to add a few considerations, to complement the excellent points made by Carl and Debashis.  In my opinion, there should be a clear distinction between:

• provisions for “proxy voting” measures in countries with consolidated and well regulated electoral processes, measure that are meant to enfranchise those electors who, for very specific reasons[1], on election day cannot vote in person; and
• the malpractice of “family voting”, whereby a dominant family member (alas, usually male) perpetrates an undue act of influence on the freedom of choice of another component of the family (alas, usually female), affecting the choice which that family member would have made on the ballot paper.

While in the majority of cases, electoral legislations generally prescribe that voters must vote in person (with the only exception of illiterate/disabled voters who specifically require assistance), I must admit to have witnessed often times the occurrence of “family voting” in a number of Eastern European, African and Arab countries.  Most typically, “family voting” was carried out in the following manner and sequence:

• (1) a family approaches the polling station to vote;
• (2) the ballot papers for all family components are issued simultaneously and handed out to the male family representative;
• (3) the whole group at once is given access to a voting compartment;
• (4) the male family representative marks the ballots for all the other members of the family and deposits them in the ballot box.

"Family voting" is a serious violation and particularly when it is malicious (that is: when it is carried out with the precise intent of influencing the freedom of choice of a voter/family member). Most often it targets vulnerable voters, being female AND illiterate voters the most frequent victims of this violation. Furthermore, there could also be instances of bona fide "family voting"  - for example a caring husband assisting his illiterate, disabled or elderly wife in making her own, free choice (this specific case of course can be easily regulated and it doesn't represent a significant problem).

I think that it is very important to highlight the fact that, when adequate legal and regulatory safeguards exist, malicious "family voting" can only occur due to the loose enforcement of polling procedures and the poor performance of poll workers on election day. Hence, such instances can only occur because of the direct responsibility on the part of those administering the polling process. Usually, the bigger the extent to which this malpractice is carried out, the greater are the needs for enhancing the professional skills of poll workers.

Therefore, there are two critical issues to consider:

• (a) what are the enabling factors for this malpractice; and
• (b) what corrective measures are possible in socio-cultural environments like the one prevailing in Macedonia.

Several factors, alone or combined, enable “family voting” to occur. Below is a list of these factors, with suggested corrective measures:

Finally, I believe that undue influence on the freedom of choice of a voter by his/her family member can be successfully eluded only if: 

• (1) vulnerable voters are fully aware and confident of the inviolability and the value of their freedom of choice; 
• (2) vulnerable voters are confident that  - no matter whom a family member has induced them to vote for - once alone in the voting compartment they will freely mark their ballot paper in absolute secrecy and NONE will ever know whom they voted for; 
• (3) there are sufficient and appropriate legal, procedural  - and even logistical - safeguards to ensure that on election day these two fundamental rights (i. e. freedom of choice + secrecy of the vote) are at all times preserved; and, finally 
• (4) those voters directly practicing this violation, or those pollworkers who - intentionally or unintentionally - allow it to occur are swiftly sanctioned.

[1] In the Netherlands and UK, for example, an elector who is abroad on election day (on some working duty) may use “proxy voting” provisions to appoint someone he/she trust to vote on his/her behalf; in both countries, a proxy voter can cast a maximum of two proxy votes in addition to his/her own vote.

Dear all, 

Many thanks for your valuable comments. I will forward them to UNDP.

In Macedonia we have indeed a combination of three enabling factors as listed by Antonio, leading in very specific areas to a large scale violation of votes’ secrecy. In the Macedonian context marked by ethnic-centered politics, proxy and family voting has been used by political forces to secure votes among ethic groups and enter into pre-electoral bargaining/power sharing exercise. Family and proxy voting is therefore intermingled with politics, in particular the way coalitions are formed.

You will find attached a synopsis of the technical assistance proposal aimed at providing a dynamic forum to raise public awareness, sensitizing leaders, training election staff and targeting vulnerable and marginalized groups on women’s disenfranchisement while also helping the State Election Commission to review its legal framework and enforce election rules and regulations.

With best regards,

Jerome

Dear Jerome,

Having worked many years in Skopje, following various rounds of elections, I cannot but find your question interesting and I would like to say that I am happy to see that UNDP has undertaken the project to raise awareness on this very sensitive and important aspect of the elections. 

I would like to underline that, based on my experience in the country and on my knowledge of local politics, I think that the phenomenon of proxy and family voting has unfortunately all too often taken a very specific connotation and has been conducted on a large scale, especially in certain areas of the country. Its results have been not only the disenfranchisement of women, but also an infringement of existing legislation which has sometimes led to blatant manipulation and even electoral fraud.

I think that in this particular country, cultural and educational circumstances around these practices do exist but they have not been and are not the main obstacle in removing these electoral malpractices. While the cultural and educational obstacles can be overcome through appropriate public awareness campaigns, the main problems connected with proxy and family voting in the country will only be eliminated through an effective  implementation of existing legislation by ALL those who are administering the elections and participating in them, whether it is the EMBs or political parties.

Unfortunately, a climate of impunity for any kind of electoral malpractice has been present in the country for a long time, however recent efforts to combat such impunity will hopefully be strengthened so that electoral officials will be trained to be able to enforce the legislation, right at the polling station, by impeding any voter to cast a ballot on behalf on another voter, with the only exceptions prescribed by the law, which are the ones that allow a person to assist a disabled, illiterate and/or elderly voter. In my experience, this has been an effective means to reduce the number of instances of family voting even in other countries of South-eastern Europe. The total eradication of this practice could take some time, because of its undeniable connection to cultural practices, but at least a strong reduction of its recurrence could be an indication of improvement in the overall administration of the elections. 

Finally, I think that the role of political parties in these practices cannot be underestimated especially in the context of local politics, as you already underlined in your last message. Therefore, I believe that any activity directed at reducing the incidence of family/proxy voting should also involve political parties, by making them responsible and accountable in the efforts to eliminate family/proxy voting.

Hope this was useful and good luck with the project!

Dear all,

It has been indeed a very interesting discussion and many valuable suggestions have been made. The implementation of such suggestions will however take very long time and considerable efforts. Many of the measures to be taken are mentioned in previous contributions and will probably be included in short-term projects. They might even offer temporary encouraging results, but might very likely be abandoned later on due to their high costs. The end of such projects will likely happen before the secular habit of  unregulated family proxy voting is truly eradicated.

 As was already said, the territorial extension of the phenomenon is that many countries of the Southern Balkan region are very large and election officials at various levels have been rather permissive with family voting in the past. I'd like to launch a provocation and hear your opinions at this regard: what about proposing changes in the legislation that would call not only for serious punishment for those permissive electoral officials, but also for the annulment of the entire polling station results in cases where unregulated family proxy voting is demonstrated/documented by a political party agent or an observer. Would such a repressive measure outweigh the disadvantages of having the phenomenon to continue plaguing the elections in the region? What sort of side consequences might it have?

Regards to all,

Domenico Tuccinardi

Ok, I cannot refrain from responding to your provocation, Domenico. While in general I tend to favour regulatory frameworks establishing clear and enforceable sanctions against perpetrators of any electoral offence that it is aimed at distorting the true expression of the will of a voter, your provocative proposal is by far too repressive and could result in controversial and destabilising effects.

In countries where the “family voting” phenomenon is well-rooted and widespread, when introduced, such a coercive approach would most likely lead to numerous instances whereby polling stations results are annulled; furthermore it could also give way to possible abuses and to undue interference in the regular conduct of the polling process - depending on how solid or loose is the basis for party/candidate agents to prove/provide evidence of the occurrence of such a malpractice.

Just imagine at the first election in which your drastic measure is adopted, what a shock nationwide for having so many polling station results annulled.  I suspect that this shocking effect could be the primary intent of your provocative proposal, as it certainly would serve the purpose of dramatically raising public awareness on the extent of the problem and that would obviously have some impact - and possibly a sharp decrease of the “family-voting” phenomenon - in elections that will follow.

As I stated before, other than going so drastic and forceful, in my opinion the most effective measure to tackle the problem of “family voting” is a gradual corrective approach that builds on the simultaneous combination of three main corrective measures:  (1) legal and procedural reforms; (2) professional training for poll workers; (3) voter education/information; and possibly to be complemented by a fourth element that I had missed before and that , rightly, you have highlighted with you provocation: (4) the adoption of clear and enforceable sanctions for those poll workers who – either for incompetence of for unethical behaviours – allow the “family voting” offence to take place.

Lastly, I am still convinced that "family voting" could only be effectively addressed by targeting the root of this problem, which is the lack of compliance to the established procedures and rules by poll workers. This could be accomplished by:

1) establishing a proper regulatory framework (when the problem is due to poorly defined, inadequate or non-existing legal provisions);

2) enhancing their professionalism (when the problem is due to their poor capacities)

3) sanctioning them (when there is enough evidence that the problem is due to their unethical behaviour).

So, before cancelling the results of a polling station and, by doing so, invalidating the majority of legitimately cast votes, I would rather attempt to intervene by correcting the elements identified above as the root causes of the problem.