IFES and AusAID have signed an agreement for a new, six month project valued at AUD $786,628. The project includes a range of initiatives to support the further development and improvement of electoral processes in Indonesia. IFES will facilitate a comprehensive review of Indonesia’s electoral legal framework, to be informed by IFES’ international comparative experience and implemented in partnership with Indonesian civil society organizations. Other initiatives in this project relate to increasing the participation of marginalized groups in the electoral process, including women and the disabled. The project will begin with a national survey that will be carefully designed by the IFES Applied Research Center in cooperation with an Indonesian polling firm. The survey will provide useful data and analysis to election stakeholders and donors that will allow them to better evaluate election performance and understand public expectations for the 2010 local elections throughout the country.

This new project will build on two previous agreements between IFES and AusAID, which supported quantitative research, voter education,  and policy reform discussions from 2008 – 2010.