I am not a lawyer. I come to you with a complementary background, that of a practitioner of the trade of democracy promotion. In practice, this means helping political actors – from citizens to institutions – assemble the components that make up a democratic system. The process in turn can help meet the standards that lead to democratic elections. Then comes the hard work of democratic governance.

There are two basic issues under consideration in today’s discussion, at times confusingly merged into one broad electoral theme. There is a focus on electoral observation standards, and there is a somewhat overlapping yet separate theme regarding the broader challenge of developing election standards.

The comments of the previous speakers call attention to the partial codifying of international election observation standards. For example, the task that the National Democratic Institute (NDI), the Carter Center, and the United Nations (UN) Electoral Assistance Division undertook to generate the Declaration of Principles and the Code of Conduct -- and ultimately endorsed by 20 or more organizations, including the International Republican Institute (IRI) – was a significant achievement. The four-year effort that concluded in a ceremony at the UN in September 2005 with Secretary General Kofi Annan was a laborious process, as Pat Merloe of NDI can attest. Trying to come up with a uniform set of standards for elections themselves faces a stiffer challenge. Just look at two areas.

First, on election administration. We see in many countries that the ability of the government to fairly, neutrally and effectively administer elections is problematic. Often times there are a lack of good solutions for this problem. Some of the problems (both intentional and unintentional) that were seen in Nigeria, recently, with regard to the National Election Commission, were some of the same problems that were observed with the Election Commission in Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, a caretaker government was created to oversee the election process, and was meant to serve as a neutral body not aligned with any government or political party. However, the caretaker government and the election commission were believed to be aligned with the previous ruling party. The perception, whether accurate or not, impacted the decision not to hold the elections as planned in January 2007.

For comparisons purposes, the U.S. system is unique. There is no national election office or ministry that oversees U.S. elections, of course. Each county runs its own system and election officials are selected in different ways in different states (some are elected, some are appointed). The state-level secretaries of state oversee elections, though their powers vary from state-to-state. It’s a bit ironic, I suppose, that we frequently point to independent or multi-party election authorities as a key benchmark in U.S. nongovernmental organization (NGO) observation reports, when in fact the U.S. system is quite different. This means no independent election commissions or independent electoral authority, no standard ballots or even method of voting (paper, punch card, electronic, etc.), no uniform laws on polling hours, massive use of absentee voting, no standardized process for dispute resolution. Amazingly, the system generally works and when there is a glitch, there is accessible legal recourse and administrative procedures (recall Florida 2000). But the uniqueness and diverse complexity on a national scale makes the American process hardly a model – although there is much to learn when disaggregated down to the local electoral district. Yet, many other democracies also do that well.

Another area is voter eligibility. In many countries where IRI (and NDI and others) work, one sees significant problems with voter registration lists. While identifying standards for how to combat these problems would be good, it is important to remember that these countries have extremely different technical and human capacities to properly register voters, create proper and fair voter registration lists, and oversee an effective process to verify voters on Election Day.

For example, for Haiti’ successive elections between 1990 and 2006 voter registration lists were created each time from scratch. If nothing else, this is an expensive proposition – entirely paid for by the international community. And each time this has happened, there was obviously no body of knowledge and expertise left behind for the next election – hence, starting from scratch.

In Bangladesh, there is no uniform national identification system. When election officials receive a voter registration list on Election Day, they have no way to properly verify someone’s identity through a photo identification.

Yet, the fact that there is an emerging body of internationally developed practices regarding election observation has had an impact on institutions engaged in the promotion of the practice of democracy, including elections. The two party institutes represented at this table (NDI and IRI) have in recent years gradually reduced the number of instances when it has fielded an observation mission. More importantly, time and experience have to a degree standardized the international practice of observations.

As an example, over the past 23 years IRI has monitored more than 130 elections. Many of these observation missions were fielded in the 1990s – some small, some large, some of a local character, others on a national scale – in 40+ countries. For the last two fiscal years, this is a short but significant list of countries – Kyrgyz Republic in summer of 2005; national elections in Afghanistan and Liberia in fall 2005; parliamentary elections in Ukraine in the spring of last year; national elections in Nicaragua last Fall; and just 10 days ago, national elections in Nigeria. One election never came off – Bangladesh this past January, where the best guesses now suggest a date in 2008 or later.

Arguably, the fact that we are engaged in fewer large or formal election observation missions implies good things. But it also draws attention to practical realities: first, while we may be engaged in a more select scope of missions, the most recent Nigerian elections suggest that performance trends are not always in the positive direction. IRI’s findings underscore an electoral performance “below the standard set by previous Nigerian elections [in 2003] and international standards witnessed by IRI around the globe.” The problem-areas include serious deficiencies with the voter registration system, and a related absence of a meaningful voter education campaign, and questionable practices regarding candidate selections and eligibility – or in fact, disqualifications. NDI likewise fielded a mission and its reporting notes at least eleven “serious irregularities.”

A second point to draw from a trend toward a more select number of international observation missions is that it focuses increased attention on other components of the democratic process. This underscores the work that has to be done before elections. In fact, rather than parachuting in for an election, it is the lead-in period where the real action lies.

This aspect of the promotion of the practice of democratic elections entails the engagement of a tool kit that appears familiar to all of us – but generally less so in many parts of the world where the practices of competing and winning elections can still be a stark political test with life or death implications. In our practice at IRI – or NDI – the anticipation of an election implies a variety of training activities with political parties, campaign organizations, and civil society groups: political communications and message development; get-out-the-vote strategies; public opinion polling and analysis; outreach to marginalized voter groups; voter registration drives; working to help establish campaign rules or codes of conduct, sometimes with civil society partners; training poll watchers, and so forth.

Let me illustrate this briefly by drawing from our recent institutional experience. A good place to start is Morocco. International monitors have not been accepted in the past, which raises a question about whether this will change. There is no immediate indication at this point of what is going to happen. So, what to do?

Morocco just passed a new political party law. It includes rules about women and youth participation as well as financing and other issues. A focus of our work is on helping sensitize the parties to the new reality, including compliance with elements in the law regarding women and youth representation quotas. The law also mandates that the parties have a certain level of national representation to qualify as registered parties. This suggests working with some of the smaller parties on ensuring they meet their membership and geographic representation requirements. In a broader context, it is also likely that a new election law in Morocco will surface. That suggests programming that assists parties plan and conduct effective campaigns according to the new elements of the law.

Programming experience in Lebanon is also relevant here. IRI is teaming up with IFES to conduct briefing sessions with the parties on the proposed Boutros Commission (formed in August 2005, and named after the former foreign minister) draft electoral law. Although neither IRI nor IFES have stated or specific positions on the draft law, it is important to help think through with political parties the implications for them of a mixed proportional/ majoritarian system and how it would impact their organizational development and campaign strategies. A working assumption here is that the proposed Boutros Commission electoral law reform meets international standards.

Haiti presents a different mix of experiences. In connection with the 2006 election cycle, IRI conducted civic education and candidate debate forums across Haiti’s 10 departments for more than 33,000 Haitians. These trainings occurred over the course of Haiti’s delayed 18 month electoral cycle, and helped prepare and energize voters and candidates for presidential, parliamentary and local and municipal elections. IRI also provided training sessions for qualified women candidates throughout their parliamentary, municipal and local campaigns. Of the eight women eventually elected to parliament, seven received training support from IRI.

In a different vein programmatically, between June 2005 and October 2006, IRI formed and sponsored four missions by the Haiti International Assessment Committee, whose bi-partisan and international membership provided diplomatic support for the development and execution – imperfect perhaps but acceptable non-the-less by historical standards – of Haiti’s elections cycle. This four-person committee included former Senator Bob Graham and former Congressman Ben Gilman as well as the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada and former Assistant Secretary General of the Organization of American States and senior diplomat from Trinidad and Tobago. They met with Rene Preval three times, once when he was a candidate, a second time when he president-elect, and ultimately after his inauguration.

Turning to Asia, in Bangladesh last year, IRI arranged for a Long-Term Observation Mission which would have placed people on the ground several weeks before the January 2007 parliamentary elections and for a few weeks after the elections. IRI trained 737 master trainers from a group of 10 domestic election monitoring organizations. In addition, IRI trained 75 of 150 observers from IRI’s domestic election observation partner, which would have assisted IRI-supported domestic long-term observation teams. Obviously, this is one case where all of this, for now, came for naught.

In East Timor, for more than a year prior to the current cycle of the presidential and parliamentary elections, IRI has helped form and guide an electoral working group, which has consisted of political party members, civil society activists and local academics, to effect the drafting of a national election law. This working group was exposed to the election laws of other countries (including a study tour to New Zealand to meet first hand with their election administration officials) and then held public forums and meetings with election officials while the law was being drafted. The working group also participated in public hearings before Parliament while the draft election law was being debated. For parliamentary elections scheduled for June 30, IRI will conduct party agent trainings in each district around the country.

For Nigeria’s recent and frustrating effort, pre-election activity included holding campaign schools for candidates in all six geopolitical zones, and doing the same for poll monitor training. IRI also printed and distributed 500,000 poll monitor handbooks explaining the voting process; apparently they were good enough that the electoral commission decided to reproduce our text with their logo.

In a laborious process that lasted several months, there were also negotiations to agree to a party code of conduct with the majority of Nigerian parties to provide dispute resolution mechanisms and get the parties to agree to avoid violence in the pre and post election environments. While the parties ended up doing what they wanted anyway, even getting them to sit down at a table together to negotiate out the document was a significant achievement.

In late 2005, a similar and more successful effort was undertaken in Liberia, which ultimately led to the election of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf against George Weah. It is worth recalling that following the first round of those elections, things were somewhat touch and go, with Weah crying foul and potentially inviting his young supporters toward mischief. It did not happen.

Slovakia’s 1998 parliamentary elections generated a need to provide greater ballot security in what were expected to be troublesome elections. IRI and partners conducted a large-scale ballot security training effort, including the printing and distribution of manuals, working to improve the professionalism of both party and NGO domestic monitors.

And finally, Iraq, where we have had programming since the fall of 2003. The work of democracy promotion and more narrowly preparing for democratic elections has not always matched the political headlines about Iraq. Iraqis are engaged and elements of democratic development have been achieved. Starting in late 2004 and continuing at various points throughout 2005, work was done in connection with the lead-in to the cycle of elections that year: January and December national elections and the October 2005 constitutional referendum.

Very briefly, this included:

• Fielding 15 public opinion polls, or baseline assessment against which to gauge public understanding of these various electoral contests.
• In the run-up to the December 2005 elections, conducting 17 campaign management training seminars; also, training party agents (as party observers of the elections, to build confidence and transparency), printing and distribution of 50,000 party agent manuals and about 2,000 DVDs.
• Producing and airing 10 TV political debates.
• And working with Iraqi NGOs on voter education through media campaigns, TV ads and talk shows, posters and fliers, and also working with women’s NGOs to mobilize women voters, same with university students.

And the list goes on. What we take from these various experiences is a belief that raising the bar of international election standards is in part a question of practice and repetition, trial and error, and preparation that occurs either between elections or if none have occurred recently, in the lead-in to an election. Elections take place, performances are improved, and best practices institutionalized through long-term work – teaching candidates and the electorate among other things to learn from losing, or at minimum agree on the boundaries on what it means to lose and win, and also to anticipate the requirements of good governance when elected.

Thank you.

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