Dominating the headlines out of Africa over the past few years have been several dramatic failures of democracy. Violence between political parties before and during Nigeria’s flawed elections in April 2007 caused more than 200 deaths. The December 2007 elections in Kenya set off a nationwide political, economic and humanitarian crisis leaving more than 1,500 dead and 300,000 displaced. Recently, Zimbabwe’s June 2008 runoff presidential election was characterized by widespread and brutal political violence that left hundreds dead and thousands abducted. In September 2009, the lead-up to Guinea’s January 2010 presidential elections sparked violence that left over 150 civilians dead. Election violence, however, is not restricted to Africa. The 2008 Bangladeshi general elections resulted in disturbing post-election incidents between rival factions. In April 2009 in Moldova, post-election mobs used social media to stage a protest which resulted in burning the parliament. The Iranian elections of June 2009 were followed by violent clashes that glued observers around the world to their TV and computer screens.
These violent displays present a challenge to the idea that free and fair elections are possible in highly divided or conflictual societies, or in countries with weak rule of law and state authority. Few, however, are prepared to advocate autocracy or challenge the ultimate desirability of democratic governance. Such drastic measures are also not necessary. There are ways to lessen and eventually mitigate election violence. IFES employs two methods.
The first method IFES employs to mitigate election violence is working with electoral commissions and stakeholders to develop the systemic and structural characteristics electoral agencies must embody to avoid the need to express through violence. After all, while election-related conflict or violence is often blamed on the mere occurrence of elections, in reality, it is often a result of shortcomings or failures in the electoral process. When capacity and political will are present—in the form of a high-quality independent electoral commission—election violence rarely occurs. The characteristics that an electoral commission must possess in order to implement a good election and diminish the likelihood of conflict include: perceived independence, impartiality, integrity, accountability and transparency—qualities essential to garnering public trust in the electoral process. Without this trust, electoral stakeholders are more likely to resort to violence as a political tool.
An electoral commission must also effectively implement all aspects of the electoral cycle and work toward preventing, mitigating and resolving election violence at every stage. Effective actions against election violence include:
- clear and fair definitions of the voter
- A candidate and party registration process giving all parties equal opportunity
- Encouraging political parties to sign codes of conduct prior to the campaign period
- Powers to enforce sanctions for violations of the code or other regulations
- Establishing a system for counting, tabulating and announcing votes as transparently and quickly as possible.
Another method proven to be effective in diminishing election violence is IFES’ Election Violence Education and Resolution (EVER) Project. EVER works through civil society to address the potential for violence and its expression at every stage of the electoral cycle. After all, a country’s electoral commission is only one actor in the fight against election violence; to be successful this effort must extend throughout society.
Tailored to each country, the EVER Project builds the capacity of local civil society organizations and provides these organizations with training and tools to better monitor, publicize and mitigate violence throughout the electoral cycle. These tools include how to map potential and ongoing election-related conflict or violence and generating alerts and producing reports based on the data gathered. EVER’s monitoring tools are supplemented with a variety of mitigation techniques that include training stakeholders in rapid response, information sharing and coordination, and conflict resolution so they can quickly and effectively intervene to prevent or mitigate conflict reported by local monitors.
As these two methods show, the problem of election violence cannot be solved with a one-dimensional approach. Official mechanisms, civil society, and political and security actors all have a role to play; indeed one of the key issues is often improving coordination and communication between all the actors involved in the elections process. Hence IFES’ approach: using our key strengths and our lessons learned, we work with partners in all parts of the process. Together we can all work towards ensuring election violence is prevented and mitigated.