By Ai Watanabe
As the world moves toward democracy, the means of public political participation have increased over time. The most fundamental method of the participation is participation in democratic elections. This includes participation as a voter, as a candidate, and as a supporter of a candidate or political party. Universal suffrage is common in most parts of the world today, and elections are becoming more competitive. The competition can make it difficult for governments and electoral managers to maintain election integrity since some candidates who are not able to succeed in free or fair elections can turn to fraud, intimidation, and discrimination in order to assure a win. Despite these difficulties, most governments and election managers make substantial efforts to ensure election integrity, so that free and fair elections may be guaranteed to every citizen.
Expansion of Suffrage
Universal suffrage has become prevalent in most parts of the world as a result of continuing electoral reforms throughout history. Ancient Greek and Roman assemblies first developed elections. Then the electoral process expanded to local and regional assemblies in Europe during the Middle Ages. However, modern elections were established in the Europe and the United States in the 17th century. In Political Manipulation and Administrative Power, the author Eva Etzioni-Halevy defined a modern election as 'the basis for the selection of parliamentary assemblies,' 'focussed on the individual as the electoral unit to be counted,' and 'considered as the mechanism of establishing the consent of the governed to those who governs them.'31 This is the concept of a representative government based on one-person-one-vote. However, these principles were not commonly practiced.
Until the 19th century, most countries in Europe and the United States granted suffrage to only those who held recognized community membership. This membership tended to be in association with nobility, clergy, and/or in relation to ones in power.32 In the 19th century, revolutions in Europe reversed the monarchical control to popular assemblies. Civil access to political participation was extended, and suffrage was given to men who met the property and/or income criteria. Nevertheless, suffrage was still limited to the elite minority population, and there were problems of multiple voting and unequal voting ratios for representation. By the late 19th century, most suffrage criterion for social and economic status had been abolished as the revolutions and industrialization in Europe triggered movements by labour organizations. As a result, most of the adult males in Europe and the United States gained suffrage.
Women were denied suffrage for a long period of time, even though they comprise approximately half of the world's population. Women acquired suffrage in the Western sphere in the late 19th century to the early 20th century. Women's suffrage was first established in countries with large immigrant populations; for instance, Wyoming in the United States (1890), New Zealand (1893), and South Australia (1895). Many Scandinavian countries; such as Finland, Norway, Denmark, and Sweden, followed this example during 1906 to 1921. However, Switzerland did not adopt women's suffrage until 1971. Roman countries, such as France, Belgium, and Italy, finally recognized suffrage for women after World War II.33 Other parts of the world proceeded, and most countries currently allow women's suffrage. However, some countries, including Afghanistan, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia, do not allow women to vote.34 35
The eligibility for suffrage was modified throughout history as definitions of citizenship and residence evolved. The residence requirement has varied depending on circumstances of a country. In the 19th century, many countries required long-term residence to be considered for suffrage. The long-term residence requirement was originally intended to restrict temporary mass migration in order to influence the result of an election. Also, the requirement was meant to grant voting rights to those whom would still reside in the constituency and be affected by the results of an election. However, this restriction often prevented minority, middle and lower class citizens from voting since they were more mobile or transient because of their employment situations. In the 20th century, requirements for residency term changed. Terms before one becoming eligible for suffrage became shorter, especially in local elections.36
Unequal requirements for suffrage, such as literacy and national language requirements, were used to exclude particular ethnic and racial groups in elections. For example, a literacy test was used to exclude African-Americans from obtaining suffrage in the United States in the late 19th to mid 20th century. South Africa used similar requirements to exclude non-Caucasians, who comprised 70 percent of South African population, from voting until the 1990s.37
History of Corruption and Its Regulation
Today, universal suffrage has been achieved in most parts of the world. The election process has evolved from elections by a handful of privileged elite men to one where leaders are chosen based on a system of one-person-one-vote. The elite's control over the government has weakened as the world has moved toward democracy by the expansion of suffrage, increased public political participation, and more competitive elections. Since some elites could not survive the competitive elections, they have turned to using election fraud as a means to decrease the degree of competition and sustain their power. This fraud can include bribery, undue influence, ballot stuffing, physical intimidation, and dissemination of false information. As methods and the degree of fraud grew, governments found it necessary to regulate fraud and maintain elections free and fair. Governments had various reasons to hold free and fair elections, for instance, to gain national or international respect and legitimacy.38
Significant attempts to regulate electoral fraud emerged in the late 19th century. France introduced the concept of the secret ballot in 1789; however, Australia was the first country to actually employ it in the late 1850s.39 40 The purpose of the secret ballot was to discourage bribery and intimidation. It was intended to reduce the likelihood that others would know for whom the bribed and/or intimidated citizen had voted. The United Kingdom adopted the secret ballot in 1872, and most countries in Western Europe followed in the late 19th century.41
The United Kingdom began to confront fraud and corruption with the Corrupt Practices Prevention Act of 1854 that dealt with bribery. The Ballot Act of 1872 challenged impersonation. Impersonation is when a person votes pretending to be someone else, for instance, using a name of a deceased person. The Corrupt and Illegal Practices Prevention Act of 1883 covered a variety of fraud related issues. This Act was one of the first major efforts by the United Kingdom to intensely combat corruption. It penalized candidates and others who engaged in corrupt acts, such as giving gifts to influence an election result, undue influence, illegal payments, and illegal practices including illegal employment.42
The United States dealt with corruption by political machines in the 19th century. One of the high-profile cases of corruption by political machines is that of William Tweed in Tammany Hall. Tammany Hall was the executive committee of New York City's Democratic Party organization, and it used a method called gerrymandering to manipulate elections. Gerrymandering is districting or redistricting in a discriminatory manner. This discriminatory districting strengthens one political group and weakens another.43 William Tweed was first elected as a municipal legislator in 1851. He eventually became a state senator and principal leader of Tammany Hall by 1868. With the power he secured, he created a law office to obtain financial contributions from corporations by labelling the contribution as a 'legal service fee.' He also established the New York City board of audit, enabling him to control the treasury. The estimate of the amount that he extracted from the city is between 30 million to 200 million dollars.44
Campaign finance became one of the major tools to manipulate elections. (See Campaign Financing) Some candidates used bribery to ensure their victory by buying votes and giving presents. The invention and wide distribution of television dramatically increased the amount of financing needed to campaign. The increase in the amount of money needed to run a successful campaign became dependent on raising large sums of money. Campaign contributions by individuals and organizations became common in an effort to influence the candidate's policy on various political issues. This in turn led to questions about the influence of large donors and the independence of candidates. As a result, some governments started to regulate campaign financing, such as setting limits on fund-raising and expenditures.
There are two kinds of major regulation in campaign finance: limitation of the acceptable source, and limitation of the maximum size of an acceptable contribution. In the United States, Richard Nixon utilized the fund made up with legal, yet undisclosed contributions and illegal corporate contributions for his presidential campaigns in 1968 and 1972. This fact was discovered during Nixon's Watergate hearings and disseminated to public. Public outrage caused by this scandal led to the Congressional establishment of regulation mechanisms for campaign finance. In 1974, Federal Campaign Finance Act (FECA) was amended to limit individual contributions and to require disclosure of the amount of contributions. Also, the Federal Election Commission (FEC) was established to enforce FECA in 1975.45 FEC was given authority to investigate violation of FECA and to penalize its violators.46
Prosecution of violators of electoral law is essential to ensure electoral integrity since it allocates accountability of the crime and makes the violator responsible for it. (See Accountability and Prosecution and Judicial Proceedings) In order to seek accountability of campaign participants, other countries established similar regulations and mechanisms to prosecute campaign finance abusers; for example, Canada in 1974, Japan in 1976, and Spain in 1985.47
As the world moves toward democracy, elections have become a more and more essential part of increasing public political participation. And the international standards of free and fair elections have been adopted, at least in principle, by most democracies. On the other hand, the more important elections became, the more election fraud has become refined and diverse. (For more on this see Discrimination, Intimidation and Fraud)
One of the ways to manipulate elections is that a dominant party or government administers unfair elections to maintain its advantage. For instance in Chile, legal methods to exclude potential voters from voting were adopted in 1962. The Chilean government set up a very limited and inconvenient voter registration period, which was limited to two hours each day during an eight-day period in a month.48 Changing the timing of elections is also used to influence the result of elections. The dominant party or government sometimes modifies election timing to an earlier date, so that the opposition does not have time to organize itself to acquire and mobilize public support. Such arrangements occurred in elections worldwide; for instance, Turkey in 1946 and Korea in 1985.
Transparency at all levels of elections needs to be enforced, especially at vote counting and campaign finance. Transparency in election process is necessary to attain public confidence in a government and approve the result of an election.49 Lack of transparency in electoral system makes it easier to manipulate election results. An example of non-transparent elections is the Bolivian election in 1978. It is widely assumed that General Pereda Asbun exercised fraud and won the election by 50 percent of votes, which was the exact amount of votes required to win the election. However, no one could prove the fraud because of the non-transparent electoral system.50
In the 2000 Peruvian presidential election, incumbent Alberto Fujimori was accused of large scaled election fraud including adopting a new vote counting software. The Organization of American States requested to examine the software because of unexplained ballot overcast by more than 1.4 million after the election; however, Fujimori refused the request.51 52
Intimidation of opposition candidates and their associates has also been used to decrease competition and unfairly influence an election outcome. Intimidation and harassment include physical and/or psychological threats or violence, confiscation of personal property, and imprisonment. A recent example of intimidation was made by President Robert Mugabe and his ruling party ZANU-PF in the election in Zimbabwe in 2000. The party used physical violence on supporters of the opposition party Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). The intimidation included killing of the opposition supporting farmers, and ordering hospitals to refuse treatment to opposition supporters.53
International Promotion of Free and Fair Elections
As democracy became an international concept, walls among countries became lower because of globalization. Some countries confronted election fraud in their systems; however, other countries lacked willingness and/or capacity to enforce election integrity. Therefore, the international community started to take actions to expand the free and fair election system worldwide. (See International Election Observation) International organizations, such as the United Nations and the Organization of American States, assisted many countries in achieving democracy through free and fair elections.
The United Nations' efforts toward extension of democracy through the free and fair election system started with decolonization of the world. In order to achieve democratic election, independence and self-governance was fundamental. The United Nations established the Trusteeship Council under the UN Charter XIII (articles 86-91) for decolonization of more than 80 colonies that were home to 750 million people.54 In order to accelerate the decolonization process, the General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples. Today, the number of the non-self governing territories has been reduced to 17, and they contain fewer than 2 million residents.55 Further more, according to Samuel P. Huntington, the author of The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century, the percentage of democratic states in the world increased from 19.7 percent in 1942 to 45 percent in 1990.56
The United Nations has also provided electoral assistance since its establishment in 1945. It created the Electoral Assistance Division in the UN Department of Political Affairs whose objectives are:
'to assist Member States in their efforts to hold credible and legitimate democratic elections in accordance with international recognized criteria established in universal and regional human rights instruments;'57 and
'to contribute to building the recipient country's institutional capacity to organize democratic elections that are genuine and periodic and have the full confidence of the contending parties and the electorate.'58
The United Nations has provided a variety of electoral assistance including coordination and support of international observers, technical assistance, organization and conduct of an electoral process, and supervision and verification of an electoral process. Technical assistance, such as advice and assistance for accountable electoral management and revision of electoral laws and regulation, are provided to increase the capacity of a government to administer a free and fair election.
Election observation has played a significant role in increasing transparency and attracting international attention to the integrity of an election. Election observation became more prevalent as more international donors of electoral assistance became concerned about the sound utilization of their contribution. Another organization besides the United Nation that has observed elections in order to ensure their integrity is the Organization of American States. This organization started election observation in the 1960s in countries of Latin America. It has observed more than 45 elections in countries including the Philippines, Nicaragua, and Panama.59 60
Another major way the United Nations promotes free and fair election is through their peacekeeping operations. The traditional role of peacekeeping operations has been the procurement of stability and security in a conflict zone in order to assist conflicting parties to find a peaceful resolution. However, the nature of peacekeeping operations has been modified and current operations also involve electoral observers, civilian police officers, and human rights monitors.61 These features of non-traditional operations have served as additional safeguards to guarantee the integrity of these peacekeeping elections.
Globalization and advancement of information technology has made it easier to oversee elections in the world. The rise of a global mass media has made the world aware of unethical elections and has created a universal concept of free and fair elections. (See Institutional Framework-Media, and Monitors of Election Integrity-Media) Increased communication among countries, such as the internet, international television stations, trade, and travel, enabled people in non-democratic countries to be aware of alternative political systems. Democracy became a universal norm, and principles of free and fair elections became an international goal.
The journey of achieving universal suffrage and a global value of free and fair democratic elections has come a long way. However, despite the fact that there are many mechanisms to enforce free and fair elections today, electoral fraud and corruption still exist. The right to free and fair elections is a basic human right. The effort to reduce electoral corruption and fraud should be more intensively emphasized in order to ensure free and fair elections, and to serve as a method of democratic political participation, for every citizen regardless of their ethnicity, gender, race or political and economic background.
