Principles of a Civil Registry
In planning to use a civil registry for the collection of data to be used for electoral purposes, it is
important to consider that the electoral function is only one of the purposes for which the data will
be used. For example, data from a list that is used for taxation may be used for providing social
services, such as health care insurance; for identifying citizens who are eligible for compulsory
military service; or as a basic register that records data on birth, marriage, and death for census
purposes. The key feature of the civil registry is its multifunctionality. A number of principles
characterise the civil registry:
- It is typical that more than one department or agency is involved in the development,
collection, maintenance and use of data in the civil registry.
- There normally is not cut-off data for the finalization of a civil registry, as there is for a
periodic voters list, and as there sometimes is for a continuous voters list. Because the civil registry
performs a number of functions for a number of agencies, it is imperative that it functions
continuously.
- The management of the civil registry has an important, and at times decisive, bearing on its
ability to provide election officials with a list of voters that is viewed as comprehensive. For
example, the control of the civil registry in partisan (i.e., government-appointed) hands in the
Dominican Republic in the 1980s seriously diminished the quality of data available for the voters
list.86
- A common instrument associated with the civil registry is the citizen's identification number.
When a number is linked to each citizen, there is a vastly increased capacity to join a variety of
otherwise disparate databases. Civil registries often include the assignment of such identification
numbers at birth.
Using Civil Registry Data for Electoral Purposes
The key challenge for the election authority in using the civil registry for voter registration
purposes is to find an appropriate method for mapping the needs of the electoral authority onto the
civil registry database, or as is often the case, databases. To accomplish this, it is useful to
determine the unique functions of the election authority with regard to managing a voter
registration exercise. Such functions include the following:
- acquiring a list of citizens from the civil registry
- applying exclusion criteria (based on age, citizenship, criminal conviction) to develop a
preliminary list of voters
- making known to voters their status on the preliminary list of voters, either by publicizing the
list, as in Argentina, or sending registered citizens a voter registration card, as in Sweden
- providing an opportunity for objections and claims to be filed on the basis of the preliminary
list. Note that in contrast to both the periodic voters list and the continuous list, this period of
filing objections may be the first direct contact between citizens and the election authority in the
development of the list of voters
- finalizing the list of voters and certify its accuracy
Certification, Not Data Gathering
The preceding discussion suggests that the key role of the election authority in a system using the
civil registry is in publicizing, amending and certifying data gathered for other sources, rather than
gathering the data independently. But the manner in which the voters list is overseen and managed
varies widely from one setting to another.
In Sweden, for example, the National Tax Board and the Local Tax Officers are responsible for
both the population registration and the voters list. The National Tax Board maintains a separate
election unit and a unit for population registration. The tax offices have employees who are
specialized on population registration. The voters list is compiled from the population register and
from other registers.87
In Denmark, the Ministry of the Interior is responsible for the maintenance of the civil registry, and
within the Ministry of the Interior, the government maintains a separate election unit, headed by
the election consultant.88 In Panama, the civil register is an agency of the Electoral
Court, suggesting a blurring of distinction between the civil and electoral registries.89
Inter-agency Collaboration is Key
In view of the web of interdependence required when using the civil registry for electoral purposes,
it is useful to find mechanisms that assist in ensuring that the needs of the electoral authority are
being met by the agencies charged with gathering the data that ultimately will be used for electoral
purposes. One way of facilitating this is through assigning the electoral and non-electoral functions
to a single agency or department.
With the construction of the Swedish Population Register, the data gathering may be centralized in
a single unit. The population register serves many different departments and institutions, a process
facilitated by the tax authority. Similarly, in Finland, the population register may be under the
jurisdiction of a special authority dedicated entirely to this purpose. In Sweden, only the central
authority for elections is connected with taxation, through the National Tax Board. The regional
election authorities, in contrast, are responsible for only certain parts of the voters list.
While appropriate in some settings, especially when there is a history of democratic practice,
widespread sharing of data through a civil register would not be suitable when there are concerns
about large-scale electoral fraud. In the latter case, it may be more useful to have the electoral
authority that is responsible for auditing for the department do the gathering of the data, as is done
through the office of the Electoral Auditor in Costa Rica.90 The form that this
inter-agency collaboration takes varies depending on the past history and institutional structure of a
country. What does not vary is the fact of the overarching importance of such collaboration.
Modernizing the Civil Registry
In 1995, the International Foundation for Election Systems (IFES) assessed the civil registry
system in Guyana and found it was seriously outdated. The procedures used by the national
Registration Centre relied entirely on manual clerical methods and inadequate security
mechanisms. The result, according to the report, was 'the probability of generating unreliable lists (was) very high.'91
The group responsible for the assessment recommended the adoption of the 'Barbados Model,'
which in turn was adapted from the Swedish electoral system, in which voter registration is a
function of identity card registration. The system was viewed as superior because it produces
accurate and timely voters lists and also because the identity card has many uses, thereby
decreasing its marginal cost for voter registration.92
Errors in an Initial List for the Civil Registry
In 1992, the election authority in the Seychelles was required to develop a voters list for each
electoral area. In view of the limited time and financial resources available, the election authority
used the National Identity database to develop the voters list. When the lists were made public,
there was considerable public concern over the extent of the inaccuracies, including instances in
which deceased, under-aged, and non-citizens were included, and some eligible voters were
excluded from the preliminary list. In the end, it was estimated that a remarkable 80 percent of the
eligible electorate actually checked the lists, either at the district level or at the Chief Registration
Officer's office. The fact that the Seychelles is a small geographical area with an eligible electorate
of about fifty thousand made this a less-daunting task than might be the case elsewhere.93
