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RESPONSE TO A CALL FOR URGENT ELECTORAL REFORMS: PUBLIC TRUST COMES FROM TRUSTWORTHY INSTITUTIONS
14:02, December 10, 2012
By Gabriel Armas-Cardona
This is a response to the recent "Call for Urgent Measures for
Ensuring the Legitimacy of Electoral Processes in Armenia" put out by
a group of NGOs including the Transparency International
Anti-corruption Center and the Helsinki Citizens' Assembly Vanadzor
Office. While I agree that their suggested electoral reforms are good,
almost none of the suggestions will ensure public trust and a sense of
legitimacy in the government. Instead, what Armenia needs to focus on
is developing effective institutions, with or without better election
procedures.
The Minor Impact of Electoral Reforms
The three main criticisms of the NGOs are the misuse of administrative
resources, inflated voter lists and distortion of voting processes.
Each of these issues undoubtedly affects the quality of elections in
Armenia, but it's less clear how much each issue affects a sense of
legitimacy in the government. The core reason that fixing these issues
would not cause a political change in Armenia is that multiple polls
demonstrate that most Armenians will continue to vote for the dominant
parties. Removing election irregularities will only better express
what the voters are saying: keep the same parties in power.
The minor significance of inflated voter lists and distortion of
voting processes
Two of the article's key points are the inflated voter lists and that
the distortion of voting processes jeopardize the legitimacy of the
election. The inflated voter lists point to the creation of fake
people that will vote for whoever created them. The distortion of
voting processes refers to the 17,889 inconsistencies found during the
2012 election. Both issues sound bad, but as the Gallup exit poll
matched the results of the 2012 parliamentary election, their impact
is minor. These problems are not large enough to sway an election, so
fixing them will not change who is in power.
The minimal impact of these irregularities is supported by ODIHR's
characterization of the 2012 parliamentary election as "competitive,
vibrant and largely peaceful." There is no doubt these irregularities
are a problem, but the amount of irregularities is dropping with time
and thus their ability to affect an election is also dropping. As long
as there is a clear winner in elections, the impact of these
irregularities is negligible. More work needs to be done to bring this
number closer to zero, but these irregularities are low on the
priority list compared to the much larger systemic issues like
corruption that make people distrust the government.
Decreasing the Misuse of Administrative Resources: Good Idea for the Long-Term
Decreasing the misuse of administrative resources could have an impact
on elections but only over the long term. As long as smaller parties
are able to connect to voters and have an opportunity to try to win
their votes, then the misuse of administrative resources cannot
dramatically change an election. The misuse of administrative
resources gives the party in power an unfair benefit over other
parties, especially new ones. And, if smaller parties are not able to
reach out to voters, then there could be a more serious problem as
voters are not able to make a reasoned choice of which party they
prefer. However, again, considering how much popular support the
dominant party has, this one issue can't change an election. Fixing
the misuse of administrative resources will lead to a more balanced
playing field for the parties, but it won't lead to political change
any time soon.
Promoting Trust in Elections by Institutions doing their Jobs Impartially
The big problem with the distrust Armenians have regarding elections
and the government is that they don't trust the institutions that are
meant to ensure the legitimacy of the process. If the institutions
meant to guard the election are themselves untrustworthy, then there
is no reason to believe their work would be impartial.
As the Urgent Call itself points out, there were many instances of
alleged violations that the key institutions tasked with protecting
the election did nothing about. With the large number of reported
violations, the police had many opportunities to investigate the
allegations. Unfortunately, the police failed to investigate these
cases and no one was punished in court. The first part of ensuring
that violators are punished, and thus deterred from committing future
violations, falls on the police to investigate electoral crimes.
While the 2012 parliamentary elections was one of the best elections
conducted in Armenia, there were many incidents of violations that the
police did not investigate. As the Urgent Call points out, individual
people recorded numerous examples of irregularities. A reporter from
CivilNet recorded some of these incidents, piecing together discrete
incidents into evidence of a larger conspiracy, and reported them to
the police. The police responded with a letter essentially saying
"nobody saw anything" without even questioning the reporter. The
people see that the police are not willing to investigate these
incidents, damaging any confidence the people have in the police
generally and destroying it when it comes to ensuring fair elections.
A vital first step to increasing popular trust in elections is to have
the police investigate violations of the elections.
Investigation isn't enough; a court must punish the violators. Even if
the police do investigate violations, without a prosecutor to bring
the case to court and a judge willing to impartially weigh the
evidence, public faith won't increase. With the lack of independent
and impartial judges, it will be a challenge to ensure violators are
found guilty, but seeing this punishment is the only way for people to
believe that elections are not just a tool of the government to keep
power.
When there is faith in Armenia's electoral system, then 1) new parties
will have a fair chance to win elections, 2) citizens will pay more
attention to who they vote for, and 3) fair play and higher standards
will be expected from the parties. All of these will lead to more
mature elections where the parties spend less time criticizing each
other and spend more time developing good policy platforms for
Armenia. When only 12-13% of Armenians having confidence in the
government, systemic change is needed, not just tinkering around the
edges.
Gabriel Armas-Cardona is a lawyer in New York State and was a legal
fellow at the Office of the Human Rights Defender of the Republic of
Armenia. He regularly comments on the politics and human rights
situation of Armenia on his blog.
http://hetq.am/eng/opinion/21405/response-to-a-call-for-urgent-electoral-reforms-public-trust-comes-from-trustworthy-institutions.html
14:02, December 10, 2012
By Gabriel Armas-Cardona
This is a response to the recent "Call for Urgent Measures for
Ensuring the Legitimacy of Electoral Processes in Armenia" put out by
a group of NGOs including the Transparency International
Anti-corruption Center and the Helsinki Citizens' Assembly Vanadzor
Office. While I agree that their suggested electoral reforms are good,
almost none of the suggestions will ensure public trust and a sense of
legitimacy in the government. Instead, what Armenia needs to focus on
is developing effective institutions, with or without better election
procedures.
The Minor Impact of Electoral Reforms
The three main criticisms of the NGOs are the misuse of administrative
resources, inflated voter lists and distortion of voting processes.
Each of these issues undoubtedly affects the quality of elections in
Armenia, but it's less clear how much each issue affects a sense of
legitimacy in the government. The core reason that fixing these issues
would not cause a political change in Armenia is that multiple polls
demonstrate that most Armenians will continue to vote for the dominant
parties. Removing election irregularities will only better express
what the voters are saying: keep the same parties in power.
The minor significance of inflated voter lists and distortion of
voting processes
Two of the article's key points are the inflated voter lists and that
the distortion of voting processes jeopardize the legitimacy of the
election. The inflated voter lists point to the creation of fake
people that will vote for whoever created them. The distortion of
voting processes refers to the 17,889 inconsistencies found during the
2012 election. Both issues sound bad, but as the Gallup exit poll
matched the results of the 2012 parliamentary election, their impact
is minor. These problems are not large enough to sway an election, so
fixing them will not change who is in power.
The minimal impact of these irregularities is supported by ODIHR's
characterization of the 2012 parliamentary election as "competitive,
vibrant and largely peaceful." There is no doubt these irregularities
are a problem, but the amount of irregularities is dropping with time
and thus their ability to affect an election is also dropping. As long
as there is a clear winner in elections, the impact of these
irregularities is negligible. More work needs to be done to bring this
number closer to zero, but these irregularities are low on the
priority list compared to the much larger systemic issues like
corruption that make people distrust the government.
Decreasing the Misuse of Administrative Resources: Good Idea for the Long-Term
Decreasing the misuse of administrative resources could have an impact
on elections but only over the long term. As long as smaller parties
are able to connect to voters and have an opportunity to try to win
their votes, then the misuse of administrative resources cannot
dramatically change an election. The misuse of administrative
resources gives the party in power an unfair benefit over other
parties, especially new ones. And, if smaller parties are not able to
reach out to voters, then there could be a more serious problem as
voters are not able to make a reasoned choice of which party they
prefer. However, again, considering how much popular support the
dominant party has, this one issue can't change an election. Fixing
the misuse of administrative resources will lead to a more balanced
playing field for the parties, but it won't lead to political change
any time soon.
Promoting Trust in Elections by Institutions doing their Jobs Impartially
The big problem with the distrust Armenians have regarding elections
and the government is that they don't trust the institutions that are
meant to ensure the legitimacy of the process. If the institutions
meant to guard the election are themselves untrustworthy, then there
is no reason to believe their work would be impartial.
As the Urgent Call itself points out, there were many instances of
alleged violations that the key institutions tasked with protecting
the election did nothing about. With the large number of reported
violations, the police had many opportunities to investigate the
allegations. Unfortunately, the police failed to investigate these
cases and no one was punished in court. The first part of ensuring
that violators are punished, and thus deterred from committing future
violations, falls on the police to investigate electoral crimes.
While the 2012 parliamentary elections was one of the best elections
conducted in Armenia, there were many incidents of violations that the
police did not investigate. As the Urgent Call points out, individual
people recorded numerous examples of irregularities. A reporter from
CivilNet recorded some of these incidents, piecing together discrete
incidents into evidence of a larger conspiracy, and reported them to
the police. The police responded with a letter essentially saying
"nobody saw anything" without even questioning the reporter. The
people see that the police are not willing to investigate these
incidents, damaging any confidence the people have in the police
generally and destroying it when it comes to ensuring fair elections.
A vital first step to increasing popular trust in elections is to have
the police investigate violations of the elections.
Investigation isn't enough; a court must punish the violators. Even if
the police do investigate violations, without a prosecutor to bring
the case to court and a judge willing to impartially weigh the
evidence, public faith won't increase. With the lack of independent
and impartial judges, it will be a challenge to ensure violators are
found guilty, but seeing this punishment is the only way for people to
believe that elections are not just a tool of the government to keep
power.
When there is faith in Armenia's electoral system, then 1) new parties
will have a fair chance to win elections, 2) citizens will pay more
attention to who they vote for, and 3) fair play and higher standards
will be expected from the parties. All of these will lead to more
mature elections where the parties spend less time criticizing each
other and spend more time developing good policy platforms for
Armenia. When only 12-13% of Armenians having confidence in the
government, systemic change is needed, not just tinkering around the
edges.
Gabriel Armas-Cardona is a lawyer in New York State and was a legal
fellow at the Office of the Human Rights Defender of the Republic of
Armenia. He regularly comments on the politics and human rights
situation of Armenia on his blog.
http://hetq.am/eng/opinion/21405/response-to-a-call-for-urgent-electoral-reforms-public-trust-comes-from-trustworthy-institutions.html