Importance of Viable Management Structure
The administrative structure for voting operations needs to effectively translate defined accountabilities for election management, which would normally and properly be defined in legislation or regulations, into task and activity management. The nature of the electoral management body, no less than the specific social and cultural context of the country, will have a significant impact on choices of cost-effective measures for conducting voting.
There is typically a very short time frame between election announcement and voting day in which to deliver voting services. The simpler the organisational structure for the management of voting, the more likely the delivery of quality, consistent service to all voters. Some significant organisational structure issues for voting operations are dealt with below. (A detailed discussion of the possible types of electoral management structures and their impacts on election processes can be found in Types of Electoral Management Bodies.)
Independence of Electoral Management Body
Independent electoral management bodies will generally be able to act in a more swift and decisive way in making decisions on matters affecting voting operations. Where electoral management bodies are politically answerable, political interference in the conduct of voting is always a possibility, with the consequent need for careful consideration of potential contingencies and perhaps some restrictions on the choice of cost-effective methods. Where electoral management bodies represent a balance of political forces, there may be time lags in decision-making. These factors need to be considered in developing administrative time tables and work plans for voting.
Permanence and Professionalism
Permanent electoral management bodies will bring corporate experience and a greater basis for professionalism to voting operations than bodies appointed temporarily to conduct voting. While such permanent bodies come at a significant ongoing cost, the benefits in reliability and cost-effectiveness of voting operations are significant, including:
- the assembling of a team of professional staff undergoing continuous training to develop their professional knowledge, management and team skills;
- the ability to undertake preparations for voting, both in planning and in acquisition of the required resources, throughout the whole period between elections, rather than this being compressed into a short, pre-voting day period. (This can both improve the cost-effectiveness of resource acquisition and, through early implementation of functions such as voting site identification, development and planning of staff recruitment and training programs and materials and logistics planning, can reduce the pressure on staff and control mechanisms during the election period and hence assist quality control);
- continual development and thorough testing of new systems and procedures to improve voter service and cost-effectiveness of operations.
Centralised or Decentralised Operations
While maintaining a core central presence assists in voting operations planning, the implementation of voting is usually at a local level. Maintaining a permanent local network of electoral management body offices, while an ideal for professionalism and service to voters, is generally not justifiable in cost terms. However, both election preparedness and cost-effectiveness may be enhanced by agency arrangements whereby bodies such as local governments assume responsibility, under central electoral management body supervision, for preparations for voting. Maintaining some local presence will assist in
- effective local organisation of voting processes, through local knowledge of potential voting locations, transport routes, recruitment possibilities and the characteristics of voters in the area;
- ongoing election preparations at a local level, in developing local budget and materials needs, maintenance of locally stored equipment and pre-packaging of materials;
- providing an experienced network of staff for local management of voting.
While the ability to maintain a local presence will enhance effective preparations for voting, whether it is appropriate for a particular environment will depend on costs, and the permanent capacity of the electoral management body to manage the activities of such a network.
Delegation of Powers: Local or Central Control
There are two basic questions critical to voting operations management:
- Who is responsible for the implementation of the various component activities of voting in particular electoral areas?
- Where are these responsible staff located?
How these questions are resolved will have a very large impact on the appropriate methods of planning and implementing voting operations. The first question would normally be answered in the legal framework. It would be normal, for elections based on electing representatives for small individual electoral districts, that a designated post or posts--whether they are known as returning officers, electoral district managers, local electoral commissions or similar title--be accountable for the conduct of voting within an electoral district. Where, for particular elections, countries, provinces or states form an electoral district as a whole, legislation may also specify the breakdown of this into electoral administrative areas, possibly based on other institutional boundaries such as local government areas, for the purposes of election administration.
Where administrators are to be located may also be specified in the legal framework or subject to state policy, in requiring that for an election an administration office be set up, for each electoral district or area, within the boundaries of that district. However, it may be more cost-effective to defer such decisions to administrative discretion. Depending on such issues as geographic size, voter population and infrastructure of electoral districts, it may well be more effective to use available staff to manage more than one electoral district from a single location.
In determining the location of administration offices and division of powers between local and central election management offices, the following factors need to be considered:
Voting is a localised, dispersed, activity. Management of voting implementation at a local level can provide faster response to incipient problems, provide the benefits of local knowledge of the area, and break voting management tasks down into more easily controllable geographic area responsibilities. Overly centralised management of voting processes can lead to inefficiencies through long and more complex supply and decision-making lines, and concentration of decision-making powers in a single or few areas. Totally centralised management places great reliance on a very high level of performance in a single location in a high stress environment. Systems failures will be more difficult to isolate, communication with a multiplicity of locations may be more difficult to control, and supervisory and quality control functions will be under pressure.
Administrative efficiency. While direct implementation of all voting activities from a central point is likely to lead to inefficiencies, it is usually not necessary to establish a voting operations administration office in each electoral district. Depending on the availability of qualified local managers, the characteristics of the areas to be served, the ability to maintain service to voters and the efficiencies that can be gained through more effective use of staff, equipment and premises, one local administration office may be able to serve a number of electoral districts. However, such situations are more likely to be the exception than the rule. Potential co-locations of local offices need to be considered on their merits.
The cost-effectiveness, integrity, and enhanced voter service provided by consistency of procedures. In environments where total control of election management is in the hands of local bodies, inconsistencies in procedures--forms design, methods of voting, voting station equipment, services and layouts--can increase materials and equipment costs, can result in wide variations in voter service standards, can create inconsistencies in application of integrity standards, and may lead to more localised, fragmented and expensive voter information campaigns.
Centrally-managed procedural and policy development, overall planning, bulk materials acquisitions and service quality control, combined with local management of implementation of voting operations, will generally provide a mix that best serves voters and improves cost-effectiveness of voting operations. (For further discussion of possible divisions of local and central responsibilities for electoral management, see Decision Making Options.)
Communications Structure
Voting operations take place in a fast-moving environment, generally under very tight deadlines. It is imperative that administrative structures allow swift and accurate transmission of instructions and information from the central electoral management body to regional or local administration offices, and then from there to voting stations and count locations. Similarly, feedback and data from election staff in the field needs to be swiftly communicated to the central electoral management body.
In developing administrative structures for voting, chains of command need to be kept short and simple to promote effective information flow. Excessive steps--such as from central, to regional, to area, to electoral district, to voting station management--should be avoided, as they will both slow down information transfer and increase the potential for messages to be distorted. 'Flat' management and communication structures that allow direct information flow and control from the central electoral management body to local electoral district/area offices and back would generally improve communication effectiveness.
Administrative and Technical Guidance
Voting operations administrators, no less than workers in voting stations, require guidance in both their general administration role and in the specific actions that they need to undertake to ensure that legislative, policy and procedural requirements are followed, and that voters receive a consistent quality of service. Appropriate contents for administration manuals for voting operations are further discussed at Manuals. (Examples of general manuals for the use of administrative staff in managing voting operations can be found at Preparation for Elections Manual - Trinidad and Tobago, Returning Officer's Manual - New Zealand, 1996, and Divisional Office Procedures, Elections - Australia 1996.)
