Rank Choice Voting | Myanmar | Hong-Kong | Russia | EU's national polls | Uganda | Hong Kong | Foreign Interference | Tech ⊕ unrelated cool extras online.

11 March 2020: the weekly dispatch of Electoral Affairs 🗳 -- a free newsletter on elections, democracy and human rights.

The Reads 

1. The USA 

In the US, there are as many electoral codes and laws as there are states and as many electoral arrangements as there are counties: many. Maybe that is also the reason why the partisan attempts to change boundaries constituencies, identification regulation and ballot distribution rules for the 2022 midterm elections are already now in their full swing. No, there is no mystery that the Republican Party is doing whatever it can to restrict citizens' right to vote and limit the poll of eligible voters. For those interested in state-by-state situations electionline.org is the place to go. Another good portal for the US’s electoral affairs is The Fulcrum. 

There is also another trend: the Rank Choice Voting, which is a US name for a system commonly known by experts as Alternative Voting (AV) or “Instant Run-Off Vote”, which seems to have a historical momentum in the USA. 

The AV is a majoritarian electoral system used in single-member-constituencies. It gives voters a larger maneuver. Rather than simply indicating their favored candidate, electors rank the candidates in the order of their choice, by marking a ‘1’ for their favorite, ‘2’ for their second choice, ‘3’ for their third choice, and so on. A candidate who has won an absolute majority of the votes (50% plus one) is immediately elected. 

However, if no candidate has an absolute majority, the candidate with the lowest number of first preferences is ‘eliminated’ from the count, and his or her ballots are examined for their second preferences. Each ballot is then transferred to whichever remaining candidate has the highest preference in the order as marked on the ballot paper. This process is repeated until one candidate has an absolute majority, and is declared duly elected. 

Naturally, the AV system is much more open than the simplistic first-past-the-post by allowing more diverse candidates to run and the votes cast on them are much more relevant. This is why many women organizations and minority communities are campaigning for its adoption. 

2. Europe

Few elections ahead in Europe. In the Netherlands, elections take place traditionally on Wednesdays, and the next poll to elect 150 members of the Parliament is in exactly six days. Finland decided to postpone its local polls from April to June. One of the most important national polls in the EU is the parliamentary election in Germany this September there is no surprise that Germany is also the target of foreign interference from Russia. 

Carnegie asks: How the EU Can Better Avoid Bankrolling Authoritarianism and the European Parliament publishes a brief: “Support For Democracy Through Eu External Policy”.

3. Hong-Kong

The Chinese authorities changed the electoral law of Hong-Kong and postponed the elections there yet again. While countries in the region are going through very different contexts, the democratic opposition seems to be uniting, at least online. 

4. Russia 

It is a hot year for the country. Russia's legislative elections with 450 seats in the State Duma at play are scheduled for September. The EPDE, platform of domestic elections observers and the electoral integrity watchdog has a regular Russia Election Alert. The Putin regime is aiming for internet freedoms ahead of the polls.  

5. Uganda

After elections, the time comes for a deeper analysis of the country's political landscape. As African Arguments writes:

“Ethnicity isn’t meant to be a big part of politics, yet both the president and his rival accuse the other of tribalism and see themselves as its antidote.”

Foreign Interference 

Big YES to this statement: “Election Cybersecurity is About More than Just Voting Machines”.

 Can 'Exit Counselors help those manipulated by disinformation and misinformation campaigns? I am sure they can. But the root of the problem remains: Facebook still allows the posting of fake-news. UK’s BBC, as if the country didn’t have enough problems, was targeted in a coordinated attack by China. 

Tech

In Myanmar, since the February coup, protests have rocked the nation’s towns and cities. Now, activists are launching apps to expose the army’s business dealings. 
Deep Fakes are mostly targeting women, reads this new briefing. 
Meanwhile, the far-right platform Gab has been hacked. No empathy here from my side. Not even a bit, I am trying, but nah, not even remotely. 
Coda has a new report on how information war eroding political reality in Brazil. And Taiwan’s Line is fighting disinformation without sacrificing privacy. 

Seemingly Unrelated Extras 

Video Timeline: Women’s Rights in the EU. 
An invaluable black public broadcasting archive is now accessible online. 
Gallery: 12 colorful posters from the turnout campaigns in the US 2020.
History read: John Wesley Cromwell was an influential African American lawyer, educator, and activist fighting for representation of historically marginalized voices in American literature.

Seriously Unrelated But Also Good

Football: How fame abroad changes African footballers’ way of life back home. 

An essay about the British and American fascination with rocking chairs and upholstery springs in the 19th century, Hunter Dukes discovers how simple furniture technologies allowed armchair travelers to explore worlds beyond their own.

That’s it for this week.

See you next time.
DB.