Illiteracy has always been a major exclusionary factor in elections. Voters who lack the ability to read and write often find themselves unable to exercise their right to choose their leaders, given most elections system’s dependence on these critical skills. Yet a new paper by a leading provider of electronic voting offers the encouraging insight that ...
There is a persistent perception that democracy is on the wane. In fact, a report from Freedom House showed that 71 countries registered declines in political rights and civil liberties, with only 35 registering gains, marking the 12th consecutive year of decline in global freedom. The report revealed that over the period since the 12-year global slide ...
Election Day is scheduled for January 12-13. If none of the candidates wins a majority of the votes, the top two will head to a second round set for January 26-27. This will be the second direct presidential election in the history of the Czech Republic. From 1918 until 2013 the head of state ...
Arguably the biggest story in the last two years is how fake news has contaminated the news ecosystem, deceiving millions and even unduly influencing the outcome of some elections. Fake news is not a new phenomenon, and has existed in various forms through the years either as propaganda being manufactured by governments, as slanted reportage churned ...
The year 2018 will be an important one for the Americas as roughly 82% of the approximately 580 million eligible voters in the region are expected to cast a ballot in presidential, legislative or local elections. The unusually high number of expected voters is due to the fact that the four most populated countries in the ...
Around the world, key democratic institutions are taking a bad hit on their trust index. This “implosion of confidence†was revealed in the 2017 Trust Barometer conducted by Edelman Intelligence, which determined that three fourths of the general population’s trust in all four key institutions — government, media, business, and NGOs has been eroding significantly. Of ...
Nepalese voters are set to vote for federal and provincial members of parliaments in a two-phase elections set for November 26 and December 7. Local and foreign observers are closely watching the polls which they regard as the final step in the long and tumultuous process of implementing the country’s new constitution. While as many as ...
While largely underreported, well-run elections can significantly impact the economy of a country. Credible results that are acceptable to the general public have the effect of immediately dousing whatever political heat generated by the campaign and allowing for a peaceful transfer of power. Â This dispels any cloud of uncertainty and fosters a stable political climate which ...