Suitable Properties for Any Electronic Voting System

2021

In this article, we would concentrate mainly on applying modern technologies in the electoral process worldwide. Fair and free elections are supposed to be a “prerequisite” of democracy, a necessary element to secure foundational constitutional values and international legal norms. Voting is an essential tool (both mechanism and instrument) for any democratic government globally. It is the most crucial factor which makes government not only from the people but also for the people and by the people. Despite the digitalization of several vital aspects of modern life, elections are still primarily conducted offline, on paper. Even today, in 2021, the paper ballot has been used for voting in most countries worldwide, where voters mark their choice on the paper and put it in the ballot box. At the end of any elections (local, regional, national), the votes are counted, and the results are declared. Usually, voters have to be present at the polling station to vote (this makes the entire p...

JOURNAL OF POWER, POLITICS & GOVERNANCE, 2018

Under the present electoral system every citizen is entitled to voting for only one political party. However, pluralism is a cornerstone notion for democracies and consequently, when voters are entitled to voting for more than one political party, their option tends to extend on the grounds that they are provided with the capability of expressing their opinion holistically and are not confined to a single option. Such a method could be a point system, where each voter possesses a sum of points which are distributed in accordance with the voter's preferences. Consequently, this electoral system could be named "Preference -Point-Based Electoral System" (henceforth PPBES) and it should be noted that current developed would facilitate the existence of the aforementioned electoral system. The present paper aims at presenting a new electoral system, where voters are entitled to multiple options voting for.

Public Choice, 1969

This paper is a study in the theory of committees and elections. By a committee we will mean any group of people who arrive at a decision by means of voting. By a voting scheme I we will mean any method by which individual voting decisions are aggregated into committee decisions. Given various voting schemes we shall examine three techniques by which members may seek to manipulate committee decisions to their advantage: a) additions or deletions to the alternatives to be considered b) deliberate distortions of one's own voting preferences c) manipulation of the order in .which alternatives are voted upon, and shall prove some theorems about rational voting behavior when preferences are unidimensionally scalable.

2003

There are many ways to aggregate individual preferences to a collective preference or outcome. The outcome is strongly dependent on the aggregation procedure (election mechanism), rather than on the individual preferences. The Dutch election procedure is based on proportional representation, one nation-wide district, categoric voting and the Plurality ranking rule, while the British procedure is based on non-proportional representation, many districts, categoric voting and the Plurality choice rule to elect one candidate for every district. For both election mechanisms we indicate a number of paradoxes. The German hybrid system is a combination of the Dutch and British system and hence inherits the paradoxes of both systems. The STV system, used in Ireland and Malta, is based on proportional representation (per district) and on ordinal voting. Although designed with the best intentions – no vote should be wasted – , it is prone to all kinds of paradoxes. May be the worst one is that more votes for a candidate may cause him to lose his seat. The AV system, used in Australia, is based on non-proportional representation (per district) and on ordinal voting. It has all the unpleasant properties of the STV system. The same holds for the French majority-plurality rule. Arrow’s impossibility theorem is presented, roughly saying that no ‘perfect’ election procedure exists. More precisely, it gives a characterization of the dictatorial rule: it is the only preference rule that is IIA and satisfies the Pareto condition. Finally we mention characterizations of the Borda rule, the Plurality ranking rule, the British FPTP system and of k-vote rules.

Scandinavian Political Studies, 1981

The article focuses on the problem of choosing the ‘best’ voting procedure for making collective decisions. The procedures discussed are simple majority rule, Borda count, approval voting, and maximin method. The first three have been axiomatized while the maximin method has not yet been given an axiomatic characterization. The properties, in terms of which the goodness of the procedures is assessed, are dictatorship, consistency, path independence, weak axiom of revealed preference, Pareto optimality, and manipulability. It turns out that the picture emerging from the comparison of the procedures in terms of these properties is most favorable to the approval voting.

Elections and voting are fundamental to any consensus-based society. They are one of the most critical functions of democracy. There are a number of voting systems adopted all over the world with each of them having its peculiar problems. The manual voting system still appears prominent among the developed and developing nations, but with considerations being given to an electronic alternative with a view to showing most of the short comings. Furthermore, with the increased interest and attention on e-government, e-democracy and e-governance, e-voting initiatives have gained more significance. Thus, many countries are piloting with various e-voting models and systems in order to enable voting from anywhere; also, international organisations are developing standards and recommendations in this area. This paper details a review of the underlying concepts of e-voting and discusses some of the salient issues on the subject. Also, a review of common e-voting models, existing elections schemes and explanation of the usual terminologies associated with e-voting were presented.

We look at procedures for making a collective choice through approval-preferential voting. A new procedure of this kind is proposed that is in the spirit of Condorcet's last ideas on elections, namely making sure that a good choice is made rather than aiming at the best choice but not being so sure about it.

From the 1970s, the world has been undergoing the so-called “digital revolution” generally understood as the change from the me chanical and electronic technologies to the high tech, digital ones. The role of ICT has so gained in importance that some theoreticians of democracy speak of the necessity of paradigm changing as regards both the understanding of a democratic system and introdu-cing the notion of electronic democracy (e-democracy). The aim of this text is analyzing the electronic voting (e-voting) as one of important forms of electronic democracy. The article attempts at approaching several research questions. First, what is the impact of ICT on voting procedures? Secondly, what is the essence of electronic voting and what are its main features? Finally, what are the advantages and fears related to e-voting systems? This paper gives a theoretical overview of the electronic democracy and electronic voting, and demonstrates their essence, characteristics, goals. The author tries to present and critically assess the main drawbacks and problems of the existing e-voting systems. The theoretical considerations framework is based mainly on the concept of electronic democracy created by Martin Hagen. With reference to electronic voting, the author of this article uses definitions as given either by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, or the Competence Center for Electronic Voting and Participation. She also uses definitions constructed by Andrzej Kaczmarczyk, an e-voting expert.

1998

Abseact. In this work we attempt to evaluate the performance of different voting rules subject to d@erent sets of voters andparties. The method of investigation is experimental: Dtyerent sets of agents have been artificially generated and the performance of different voting rules have been evaluated relative to a simple additive social evahationjiazction. Our experiments suggest that "winner take all"voting schemes outperform voting schemes that are based on proportional representation.

Elections and voting are fundamental to any consensus-based society. They are one of the most critical functions of democracy. There are a number of voting systems adopted all over the world with each of them having its peculiar problems. The manual voting system still appears prominent among the developed and developing nations, but with considerations being given to an electronic alternative with a view to showing most of the short comings. Furthermore, with the increased interest and attention on e-government, e-democracy and e-governance, e-voting initiatives have gained more significance. Thus, many countries are piloting with various e-voting models and systems in order to enable voting from anywhere; also, international organisations are developing standards and recommendations in this area. This paper details a review of the underlying concepts of e-voting and discusses some of the salient issues on the subject. Also, a review of common e-voting models, existing elections schemes and explanation of the usual terminologies associated with e-voting were presented.