This question is posted by ACE

Civil society groups can play a significant part in voter outreach, or the process of engaging and mobilizing voters. In the United States, for instance, campaigns (e.g. 'Rock the Vote' and 'Declare Yourself' in 2008) aim to increase voter awareness and turnout,  and are often driven by non-profit, non-partisan groups. Political parties may also conduct voter registration drives to sign up potential voters. In other countries voter outreach may focus more on raising public awareness of the political and electoral process. 

The question, therefore, is threefold:

1. Who are the key stakeholders in voter outreach activities? 

2. Is there a specific body in charge of the process (e.g. election commission) ?

3. In cases where civil society and other groups drive the process, how are their activities regulated?

 

Practitioners' Network members are encouraged to provide examples from their countries of expertise.  

 

Summary of Responses

Practitioners’ Network members from around the world provided examples of key stakeholders in their countries' voter outreach activities. Members generally listed the following groups in their examples: 

• The media
• Civil Society Organizations (CSOs)
• Election Management Bodies (EMBs)
• Political parties
• International observer groups

 

Furthermore, a member shared several more groups that the United Nations identified in Iraq after 2003:

• Military and police organizations
• Unions
• Persons with disabilities
• Linguistic minorities
• Women
• Prisoners
• Hospital and psychiatric in-patients

 

While noting the presence of a range of vital stakeholders, responses ultimately suggest that the most important stakeholder is the electoral commission itself. Moreover, members demonstrated that election commissions frequently regulate the engagement of stakeholders by issuing Codes of Conduct, guidelines, and creating specialized bodies inside commissions for purposes of coordination.

For example, one member noted that the United Nations worked closely with the Baghdad election commission in Iraq, and coordinated with its Public Outreach Department to develop a strategic communications plan to effectively engage the media. With this goal in mind, the election commission developed public information products, PSAs, and regulations like media silence periods and reporting Codes of Conduct. Another member shared that Nigeria's election commission partners with CSOs for voter education programming. To ensure this, the commission created a separate advisory body on voter education, NICVEP (National Inter-Agency Advisory Committee on Voter Education and Publicity). Similarly in Sierra Leone, its National Electoral Commission has External Relations and Voter Education Units that coordinate with CSOs in voter outreach.

Several members suggested that in countries where voter registration is compulsory (e.g. Australia), and in several African countries, electoral frameworks mandate commissions to carry out voter outreach activities themselves. A member noted this to also be the case in SADC (South African Development Community), Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia, and Sierra Leone. 

Overall, member responses suggest that the body driving voter outreach depends largely upon countries’ legal frameworks surrounding voter outreach, whether voting is compulsory or voluntary, and whether external stakeholders are able to conduct voter education in an impartial and non-partisan way. Moreover, in countries where other stakeholders may drive the process, election commissions are still encouraged to regulate their roles as partners, by issuing clear guidelines and binding instruments to ensure neutrality and consistency of voter outreach messages. 

 

External Resources:

Engaging the Electorate: Initiatives to Promote Voter Turnout From Around the World (IDEA, 2006)

 

Contributing Members:

• Jacky Sutton
• Aiah Stephen Mattia
• Andrew Ellis
• Mavis Kambadza
• Lateef Alani Ige
• Jera Kide Barsaba
• Bhojraj Pokharel
• Benny Goodnews Oguejiofor
• Ilona Tip

1. In Iraq, where the concept of access to electoral information and substantive political debate was a new phenomenon until 2003, the UN identified the following key stakeholder groups in voter education and outreach:

the media; candidates; national and international observers; military and police organisations; university students; community organisations; the unions (which were established by the government and quasi official); political parties; the electoral commission; NGOs; linguistic minorities; persons with disabilities; women; prisoners; hospital and psychiatric in-patients. The most important stakeholder was the electoral commission itself, which initially did not have a public information section and which treated the media and civil society as antagonistic. The UN worked with the Public Outreach Department to develop a strategic communications strategy, set up a website and social media platforms, organise seminars for external stakeholders and develop translation services, particularly for Kurdish language products as Sorani Kurdish is an official language of Iraq. The process of introducing these changes and facilitating their implementation was slow and is still incomplete a decade later.

2. The election commission in Baghdad is responsible for ensuring equitable access to timely, accurate information to all external stakeholders. The UN managed to persuade Baghdad to delegate some of the outreach responsibilities to the Kurdistan Regional Electoral Office in Erbil, but translation issues still remain. A big problem was that electoral support is a lucrative business and many international organisations, particularly NGOs, jumped on the bandwagon to provide stakeholder training without fielding suitably qualified staff. Given the complexity of electoral processes in Iraq, where Parliament and the election commission were testing out new electoral systems with each election, the inability of media to communicate the implications of closed and open list, quotas for women, PR etc contributed to an environment of confusion and suspicion.

3. The election commission developed public information products for distribution on their website and via PSAs. The commission issued regulations for political party campaigns, media silence periods, media reporting Codes of Conduct and on some occasions threatened legal action against media and observers. There was a constant tension between constitutional requirements for freedom of expression and disproportionate government and commission interventions into media reporting that have still not been resolved.

 

Introduction: Voter turnout may be determined by varying factors, including the legal mandate to register as it obtains in some countries (Australia), or where, like in the US and other countries like mine (Sierra Leone), registration and voting are optional. Be they mandatory or optional, a high % of voter turnout for registration and voting lends higher legitimacy to the process than otherwise.

 

It is against this brief background that one may now look at the questions in their sequence.

 

1). There might be primary and secondary stakeholders in voter outreach activities and the adjective "key" may relate to the primary stakeholders, who are logically the electorate or voters, who need to be on the voters list as a primary condition to vote. The voters are actually the umbrella under which political parties, candidates, members of EMBs, civil Society organizations and various institutions and agencies are covered. Technically speaking therefore, every other stakeholder outside of the voters may be considered secondary.

 

2). Ownership and responsibility for outreach activities and processes may depend on what the legal and/or institutional framework calls for in different dispensations. In some countries, the EMB is legally mandated to carry out outreach activities. This is the case in Sierra Leone. In other dispensations, there are separate public organizations that are vested with outreach functions and responsibilities. However, wherever the locus of functions and responsibilities lie, it is very important for it to be predicated on coherence and consistency. Secondly, even in dispensations where the EMB is mandated with outreach functions and responsibilities, it cannot, all by itself do it. Meaning, that it has to rely on a variety of other institutions, public and private, formal and non-formal, to achieve success in outreach. Therefore, procedures, guidelines and contents for outreach messages need to be consistent and coherent, implying the need for very high levels of coordination and collaboration.

 

3). In Sierra Leone, CSOs that engage in electoral outreach activities take the queue from the National Electoral Commission, through its External Relations and Voter Education Units. Outreach messages developed and produced by the Commission are made available to accredited organizations that are required to disseminate the messages to their selected targets without deviating from the facts as developed and produced by the Commission. To avoid mixed and conflicting and confusing messages, the Commission serves as the clearing-house for CSOs and other agencies on which the Commission depends to reach out to the voters. In some instances the Commission draws up memoranda of understanding (MoU) as operational and binding instruments to regulate the involvement of these bodies in outreach activities.

 

In summary, whatever the legal locus of responsibility, it is very important for all those involved in outreach messaging to do so in a well-coordinated , coherent, consistent and unified manner. The least anyone can hope for is an electoral environment characterized by conflicting and confusing messages reaching out to the voters.

 

There is a collection of potentially relevant examples, case studies and contacts in the IDEA publication Engaging the Electorate: Initiatives to Promote Voter Turnout Around the World (2006). The pdf for this, which can be downloaded from the IDEA website and reproduced not-for-profit in line with the Creative Commons Licence under which it is published, is attached here.

1.  In Zimbabwe, the stakeholder in voter outreach is the EMB itself. There is a provision of inclusion of Civil Society Organisations who show their interest by making applications to the Commission for consideration.

 

2.  The process fall the department of Voter Education which is in the Operations Division.

 

3.CSOs can initiate their own materials, but they have to e approved by the Commission. Their outreach is suoervised by the EMB. So far all CSOs are being provided with the materials by the EMB for onward dissemination to the public especially for specific areas e.g. during By-elections.

When they are engaged, a contract should be signed to avoid any unforeseen  eventualities.

 

 

 

 

In Nigeria case the major stakeholders in avoter education outreach activities are the voters and elites which includes, the market women and men, the political parties, students and civil servants, etc. These are the key stakeholders majorly needs to reach out to. In order to educate them on the constitutional activites of election processes. 2. The spesific body incharge of the procss in Nigeria is Independent National Electoral Commission. 3. To my believe and understanding the few civil society group involves in the voters education is only JDPC in the past, but of recent no any group involving in the drive process. They only intrested on election observations. Base on this premise there is no any regulated measure on voters education in Nigeria for civil ssociety group.

1.  In South Sudan, the key stakeholders are: The Electoral Commission through the department of Outreach/the Civil Society Organizations/Political Parties/United Nations/Religious organizations/Community Based Organizations/Non Governmental Organizations/Women Groups/etc.

2. The Electoral Management Body through the department of Outreach.

3.  The activities are regulated through Codes of Conduct, regulations and guidelines.

 

1. In Nepal, various stakeholders play key role in voter outreach program in all aspects of electoral activities and processes. Key stakeholders in voter outreach activities involve government, non-government as well as private sector. To elaborate them they include the elections commission, national as well as local government, political parties, candidates, media, NGO and civil society organizations, community based organizations, different professional bodies/organizations, interest groups (women groups, vulnerable population groups, marginalized communities groups, etc), academicians and community teachers/educators/healers/religious organizations and so on. In true sense entire nation is mobilized during the election periods. To reach the diversified communities, during 2008 Constituent Assembly elections, materials were published/broadcasted in different 17 languages. In addition to other efforts, the election commission had deployed two volunteers (one male and one female local school teachers who knows the community and local languages) in every community to reach out all possible voters for the above purpose.
2. Election Commission (national, regional and district level) were the in charge (coordination) of the whole processes. The national voter’s education policy had elaborated the details. To support the process in a coordinated manner various multi-sector committees were formed at national, regional and district level representing GO and NGO sectors.
3. Coordination is a complex issue but it remains with the election commission. All the stakeholders, who wish to conduct the outreach programs, were advised to use the materials produced by the commission. If any agency/stakeholders wish to develop their own outreach messages or materials in that case those materials were to be endorsed by the commission.  Uniformity and consistency as well as accuracy are the key for any outreach messages. Enough precautionary measures are needed so that wrong messages are not communicated. We tried to encourage the stakeholders not to duplicate their efforts in same places and locations. However, a simple appeal did not work as it was expected. For example lots of agencies were duplicating their efforts in urban and accessible areas whereas focus of such agencies was very limited in remote and difficult areas where they need more such programs. 

Voter education is designed to educate people, and enlighten them not only about the specifics and mechanisms of the electoral process, but it is also geared towards empowering people and informing them on their rights and responsibilities in the electoral process. One of the statutory mandate of INEC Nigeria as specified in sections 2 and 154 of the Electoral Act 2010 (as amended), empowers the Commission to conduct voter and civic education as well as promote knowledge of  sound democratic practices.  Recently the Commission inaugurated what is called National Inter-Agency Advisory Committee on Voter Education and Publicity (NICVEP), the membership of NICVEP is drawn from the INEC, relevant Government Agencies and Professional Bodies. Each brings with it, considerable knowledge, expertise, resources and reach, covering every nook and corner of this vast country. It is indeed the realisation that INEC cannot singlehandedly undertake or achieve effective mobilisation and voter education with the desired reach.  This is the first time that the Commission will be engaging a wide range of agencies at a multilateral level on the task of educating, enlightening and mainstreaming voters in Nigeria in a formal and structured manner.  However, the Commission equally partners with Civil Society Organisations to conduct voter education. But we give the messages/materials as well as put mechanism in place to monitor the messages they give. 

Who are the key stakeholders in voter outreach activities?

All voters are key stakeholders. While political parties are central  to an election as an election is about the contestation between political parties, without voters no representatives can be elected.   Civil Society Organisations, the electoral authority, faith based organisations, political parties, the media all play a role in conveying voter information and broader voter/civic education to the public.

2. Is there a specific body in charge of the process (e.g. election commission) ? This differs from country country. In the SADC (Southern African DEvelopment Community) and in many African counties, the Election Management Body is tasked with conducting voter education and conveying voter information. IN most countries this is one of the responsibilities and tasks in the mandate of the EMB and contained in the relevant Electoral Commissions Acts (eg South Africa, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia etc). At the same time the EMB has a challenge to undertake this task on their own and in many countries engage with the relevant stakeholders including CSOs, the media, political parties to assist them in providing this information to the public.   In several countries, eg South Africa and in the recent  presidential, national assembly and local government elections in Zimbabwe in 2013 the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission engaged in a consultative process with CSOs to develop a voter education curriculum to ensure a common message and content

3. In cases where civil society and other groups drive the process, how are their activities regulated?

 This generally takes the form of CSOs applying to the EMB to be accredited as voter educators and in some instances agreeing to abide by the EMB voter education code of conduct.   However the independence of the CSOs in conducting voter education needs to be provided for . AT the same CSOs need to conduct voter education in a non partisan and impartial way. IT is the function of political parties to campaign for votes, and the function of the CSOs, media to convey information on the electoral process.  It is also important to distinguish between voter education, civic education and voter information. GEnerally voter information provides the voter with information about the election eg date and time of election ,where voters can access their voting stations, registration requirements, information about the electoral authority etc. Voter education is broader and includes information principles of a  credible , free and fair election; how elections fit into the broader democratic electoral process,  as well as voter information .CIvic education includes information  around citizen participation, structures of government , engagement with elected representatives as well as information on participating in the electoral process.