Suchergebnisse

Following their 'wipe-out' at the 1997 General Election, Scottish Conservatives
worked from the assumption that they had endured their own 'crisis' in
representation. The material consequences of this 'crisis' entailed losses of
!nancial and other resources, knowledge and political legitimacy. This article
describes how some Conservative activists addressed this 'crisis' in the period
leading to the 2003 local Government and Scottish Parliament elections. Their
efforts to render the secret ballot transparent in order to discern the voting
intentions of potential supporters both demonstrated and re!ected their efforts
to manage this crisis. Despite legal constraints, they constructed an imaginary of
thousands of local voters' preferences through a variety of discursive
instruments, which allowed Party activists to disaggregate the electoral roll in
order to apprehend a new whole – the Conservative electoral base. This, in turn,
enabled a Conservative politics of self-knowledge, as a form of empowerment
for these activists.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) elections since 1990 have used the Commonwealth Electoral Roll (CER) as a large under‐specified list of potential voters. Dissatisfaction with this arrangement within the Tasmanian Aboriginal community led to a trial roll of Indigenous electors being drawn up for the 2002 ATSIC elections in that State. This paper recounts a number of contexts in which this trial was developed. It also recounts the experience of the trial itself, which did not work out as successfully as those who had promoted it had hoped. Finally it looks at lessons from the trial and options for the future.

The base of a democracy lies with the voter population of that country, and they are supposed to uphold the principles of one-person, one-value and one-vote. But, how far can India's electoral rolls embrace those basic principles of democracy? In India, there are provisions for annual revision of the electoral rolls of every constituency, which includes the inclusion of eligible and exclusion of ineligible electors. In this context, it is important to examine to what extent the voter population in the electoral roll matches with the actual voter population. Which are the major states responsible for anomalies in the electoral rolls? What are the possible explanations for the inconsistencies in the electoral roll? This article addresses these issues and the findings suggest that the over-reporting of electors in the electoral rolls is to the extent of 20 million in 2004. It throws into light the exigency for improving the quality of electoral rolls timely and with proper methods prior to every election to maintain the principles of democracy.

Electoral rolls, or voter lists, as they are popularly called, are an integral part of the democratic setup of the Indian state. Along with their role in the electoral process, these lists have surfaced in the politics of Assam time and again. Especially since the 1970s, claims of non-citizens becoming enlisted voters, incorrect voter lists and the phenomenon of a 'clean' voter list have dominated electoral politics in Assam. The institutional acknowledgement of these issues culminated in the Assam Accord of 1985, establishing the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), a political party founded with the goal of 'cleaning up' the electoral rolls 'polluted with foreign nationals'. Moreover, the Assam Agitation, between 1979 and 1985, changed the public discourse on the validity of electoral rolls and turned the rolls into a major focus of political contestation; this resulted in new terms of citizenship being set. However, following this shift, a prolonged era of politicisation of these rolls continued which has lasted to this day. Recently, discussions around the electoral rolls have come to popular and academic attention in light of the updating of the National Register of Citizens and the Citizenship Amendment Act. With the updating of the Register, the goal was to achieve a fair register of voters (or citizens) without outsiders. On the other hand, the Act seeks to modify the notion of Indian citizenship with respect to specific religious identities, thereby legitimising exclusion. As of now, both the processes remain on functionally unclear and stagnant grounds, but the process of using electoral rolls as a tool for both electoral gain and the organised exclusion of a section of the population continues to haunt popular perceptions. In this article, I analyse the major junctures at which the rolls have been politicised in the course of time and also put forward current popular perceptions of these rolls among the voters in Barak Valley, the predominantly Bengali speaking region in Assam. ; Electoral rolls, or voter lists, ...

This paper analyses the problems which occurred in the 2003 Mizoram State Legislative Assembly election due to the enrolment of Bru refugees, who were staying in the relief/transitory camps of Northern Tripura, into Mizoram State electoral roll. It clearly highlights the activities and stand of Save Mizoram Committee (SMC), which was formed by various Civil Societies of Mizoram and political parties, to prevent the enrollment of Bru refugees into Mizoram electoral roll. Moreover, the steps taken up by the Election Commission of India and Mizoram State Election Department to solve the problems are also analyzed in this paper including the polling and poll percentage of Bru refugee voters in the special two polling stations namely Kanhmun and Tuipuibari within Mamit District.