The following sections deal with each of the aspects of the electoral process with specific consideration of the social and political context in which the legal procedures must regulate them.
It is not possible to create or transplant an electoral system, nor any other legal institution, without heeding the social, political, and economic context, as well as other aspects regarding the time and the place in which it will have to be applied. On the contrary, such conditions should at all times dominate the planning of reasonable objectives and the phases into which the democratisation process of a country must be divided.
The starting point of a country that has gone through a period of authoritarian rule following a previous democratic experience (the case of the Czech Republic) is not at all comparable to the starting point of a country emerging from a decolonisation process, devoid of sufficient economic or administrative elements, democratised after a long dictatorship. Neither can the democratisation strategy in a country with a high level of social and educational development, such as the states of the former Soviet Block, be the same as in a country which does not possess the minimum social structures.
The very idea that democratisation is the result of a process is a warning of how necessary it is to pay attention to the particular conditions in each country. It is a process that should not be drawn out longer than necessary, but which requires a period of stabilisation and a succession of elections and governments for it to be considered established. From this point of view, it is treacherous to be hasty. A democratisation process springing from the institutional and legal system of the non-democratic regime it is succeeding will surely be unsatisfactory. But high expectations or a sense of urgency that have not been moderated by reality, which may lead to the establishment of a model different from what the socio-political conditions point to, do not guarantee that it will take root.
Formulae guaranteeing success do not exist, but anyone who hopes to have a possibility of success must carefully consider underlying conditions or forces that characterise the nation or state, such as:
- the degree of social and economic development
- the administrative and judicial systems
- the existence or absence of an established legal system
- national organisations and political parties
- communications networks and the media
- the educational level and previous historical democratic experiences
The historical background is a core element. A great variety of examples shows that, even after decades of dictatorship, electoral preferences display constant social and territorial roots, at times to a surprising extent.
