Kenya’s electoral agency is tasked with enhancing and supporting constitutional democracy – any dysfunctions would have dire consequences.
Low voter turnout in recent Canadian elections sharply illustrates how the public is disconnected from political institutions and their representatives. How can they be re-engaged?
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young
Problems with party politics abound, largely driven by the fusion of executive and legislative powers that enforces party discipline. Here’s how to get the public more involved.
President Cyril Ramaphosa addresses a parliamentary session.
GCIS/Flickr
Parliament’s failure to live up to its constitutional mandate was noted by the State Capture Commission as having enabled former president Zuma’s regime to corrupt state behaviour with ease.
Sam Matekane, Lesotho’s new prime minister has the daunting job of restoring public trust in politics and government.
Molise Molise/AFP via Getty Images
Unable to change the country’s vulnerability to shifts in the global and regional economy, the new prime minister Matekane has few economic levers to pull.
The deliberations were characterised by disingenuous, counter-factual policy pronouncements, and de facto denials of the ANC’s culpability in causing many of the current problems facing the country.
Voters in Johannesburg queue to vote in South Africa’s May 2019 national elections.
EFE-EPA/Kim Ludbrook
Referenda may well have a place in the country’s democracy, but if the form of an electoral system can be referred to a referendum, why not capital punishment, abortion or LGBT rights?
Basotho men wearing the traditional blankets during the annual horse race held on the king’s birthday.
EFE-EPA/Kim Ludbrook
The whole idea behind independent candidates is the hope that their inclusion might improve the accountability of parliamentarians to the voters. The bill doesn’t do that.
The wave of protests across Canada against vaccine mandates are signs of growing tensions that the federal government doesn’t represent the views of many people. It’s time for election reform.
The new law makes it illegal for ‘foreign’ persons or entities to fundraise or directly spend on electioneering, or to authorise electoral material.
Our first-past-the-post electoral system works poorly when there are lots of three-way races and even some four-way races. Seats can be won with far less than a majority, meaning it’s time to revisit electoral reform.
Pietro Mattia/Unsplash
The March elections in the Netherlands, and the fact that a government still hasn’t been formed, illustrate both the benefits and problems with proportional representation.
Electoral reforms are important before Nigerians go to the polls in 2023
Olukayode Jaiyeola/NurPhoto via Getty Images
New research examines how recent federal elections would have been affected if optional preferential voting had been used. The results were not favourable to Labor.
ANC campaigners at voting station in November 2020.
Photo by Darren Stewart/Gallo Images via Getty Images
The debate about the U.S. Electoral College pits those who think the president should be chosen via popular vote versus those who believe the interests of small and large states must be balanced.
A sign keeping campaigners at a distance in the New Hampshire presidential primary election at the Town Hall in Chichester, New Hampshire, Feb. 9, 2016.
Jessica Rinaldi/The Boston Globe via Getty Images
Laws that have long kept campaigners away from voters at polling places may not work in a world where a T-shirt symbol can be interpreted as campaigning.
Adjunct Professor, Faculty of Health and Environmental Sciences, Auckland University of Technology and Professor of Political Science, Charles Sturt University
ARC Laureate Fellow, Professor of Government and International Relations at the University of Sydney and McGuire Lecturer in Comparative Politics, Harvard Kennedy School