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Election commissions are a special category of electoral management bodies emerging after World War II (1939–1945). They also appear in the form of a department of elections, an electoral council, an electoral unit, or an electoral board. A precise definition of electoral commissions is elusive because they are institutionalized on a wide spectrum, for example, a government-administered body (like Zimbabwe’s before 2008), a board of judges managing the election (as in Turkey), an independent electoral commission (IEC) of civil society members (as in India or South Africa), and a commission mainly concerned with managing campaign financing (as in the United States).

Definition

The International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance defines an electoral management body as “an organization or body which has the sole purpose of, and is legally responsible for, managing some or all of the elements that are essential for the conduct of elections and of direct democracy instruments—such as referendums, citizens’ initiatives and recall votes—if those are part of the legal framework” (quoted in Alan Wall et al.’s Electoral Management Design 2006, 5). It may be a stand-alone institution, or it may be a distinct unit within a larger body, which also may have nonelectoral responsibilities. The essential tasks of electoral commissions are to determine who qualifies as a voter, specify all the aspects of the nomination procedure, conduct the polling, count the votes, and tabulate the votes.

Shaheen Mozaffar and Andreas Schedler, in “The Comparative Study of Electoral Governance—Introduction” (2002), and Robert Pastor, in his essay “A Brief History of Electoral Commissions” (1999), draw a distinction between established and new democracies regarding electoral management. Mozaffar and Schedler observed the tendency in established democracies to overlook the importance of electoral governance in securing the credibility and continued legitimacy of elections. According to Pastor, these systems are characterized by high levels of administrative competence, and therefore little suspicion arises regarding the government’s management of elections. In new democracies, on the other hand, the need to focus on electoral management is much more pronounced. It is exacerbated by a lack of administrative capacity in the governance institutions and continuing deep-rooted suspicion between different parties and interests in the emerging democracy. Hence, an independent body is needed to level the electoral playing field.

History Of Election Commissions

The election commission, as a permanent institution, first emerged after World War II. Turkey established its Supreme Election Board, the YSK, after its 1946 election. It is a board of judges that oversees elections. The board has the status of a supreme court, but its decisions cannot be appealed.

The earliest conventional electoral commissions were those in Costa Rica and India.

After a fraudulent election in Costa Rica in 1948, a new constitution introduced a novel institution, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, to administer all aspects of the following election. The Electoral Commission India was established in 1950. The new Indian constitution stipulated that the commission was responsible for “the superintendence, direction, and control of the electoral rolls for, and the conduct of all elections to parliament and to the legislature of every state and of elections to the offices of President and Vice President.” Originally it consisted of one commissioner, but since 1989 two additional members have been appointed. They are appointed by the national president, and they can be removed through impeachment by Parliament. The Electoral Commission India has advisory jurisdiction and quasi-judicial functions, but its decisions are subject to judicial review.

In the case of an established democracy, the Watergate scandal had a profound effect on electoral management in the United States. It prompted the creation of the Federal Election Commission by Congress in 1974 as an independent regulatory agency to administer and enforce campaign-financing legislation. Its six members are appointed for six-year terms by the president and confirmed by the Senate. The Federal

Election Commission does not play the conventional role of an election commission with respect to the essential tasks mentioned earlier.

Forms Of Electoral Management Bodies

Electoral management is institutionalized in four forms, namely,

an IEC;
a governmental electoral body;
a mixed form of the first two, including a governmental management body supervised by a judicial institution; and
a multiparty election commission.

The IEC form is normally used in situations in which government institutions are not impartial enough to allow for a fair election or they do not have the necessary management capacity to do so. IECs are also used for first elections or transitional elections as part of confidence building in a peace process or democratization. They are institutionally independent and autonomous of the executive. They are in most instances accountable to the legislature, the judiciary, or the president. Commissioners are not involved in government but are nonpartisan members of civil society. Examples of IECs are those in Armenia, Australia, Canada, Costa Rica, India, Indonesia, Liberia, South Africa, Nigeria, and Thailand. In the March 2008 presidential and parliamentary elections in Zimbabwe an IEC (the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission) was used for the first time, although its independence is still questionable.

A variation on the IEC form is a transitional model. It is used as a temporary measure established by an international or regional organization to facilitate transitional elections. Some transitional models are part of a United Nations– or European Union–facilitated peace package, such as those used in Timor Leste (2000), Cambodia (1993), Bosnia-Herzegovina (1996), and Namibia (United Nations Transition Assistance Group—1990).

The governmental management body—the second form—is used when the executive branch is responsible for electoral management. It is directed by a minister or a senior civil servant and is answerable to the government. Examples of governmental management bodies are found in Denmark, New Zealand, Singapore, Tunisia, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

The mixed form of electoral management combines an independent body (responsible for policy, monitoring, and supervision) with a government department or local authority (responsible for the election’s operations). This type of commission is used in France, Japan, Spain, and most of Francophone West Africa. A multiparty election commission is not entirely independent, because of the political party representatives. An example is Angola.

As part of the third and fourth waves of democratization— especially in Africa and Latin America—independent election commissions have become a standard requirement for elections. Established democracies, on the other hand, still find it difficult to adopt such a concept.

Bibliography:

Election Commission India, www.eci.gov.in/about-eci (page no longer available).
Federal Election Commission, www.fec.gov.
Independent Electoral Commission, www.elections.org.za.
Lee, Carol F. “The Federal Election Commission, the First Amendment, and Due Process.” Yale Law Journal 89, no. 6 (May 1980): 1199–1224.
Mozaffar, Shaheen, and Andreas Schedler. “The Comparative Study of Electoral Governance—Introduction.” International Political Science Review 23, no. 1 (2002): 5–27.
Pastor, Robert A. “A Brief History of Electoral Commissions.” In The Selfrestraining State: Power and Accountability in New Democracies, edited by Andreas Schedler, Larry Diamond, and Marc F. Plattner. Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1999.
Wall, Alan, Andrew Ellis, Ayman Ayoub, Carl W. Dundas, Joram Rukambe, and Sara Staino. Electoral Management Design:The International IDEA Handbook. Stockholm, Sweden: Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, 2006.