Partisan Poll Watchers and Electoral Manipulation

Abstract

How do parties protect themselves from electoral manipulation? To answer this question, we study the drivers of polling station party representatives’ presence and their impact on electoral outcomes in an environment where electoral irregularities are common. Using election data from the Mexican Chamber of Deputies, we find a robust positive correlation between the presence of party representatives and that party’s vote share. The evidence suggests that this correlation can be attributed to party representatives influencing the electoral results. We also formulate a game theoretic model of the levels of representation chosen by parties in a given precinct and structurally estimate its parameters. We find that parties send their representatives where they expect their opponents to send their own. The finding suggests representatives play a primarily protective role, even when they are often involved in irregularities themselves.

Getting a seat at the (electoral) table: Partisan poll workers and electoral bias

“…More recent work has studied the effect of biased polling station administrators (Neggers, 2018) and poll watchers (Ascencio and Rueda, 2019;Casas, Díaz and Trindade, 2017). Neggers (2018) exploits the random assignment of Indian government officials to teams managing election stations.…”

Academics and Election Administration in Nigeria

“…This is a legacy of Nigeria's 15 years of military rule, 1983–1998. A growing literature has investigated how electoral irregularities occur (Ascencio & Rueda, 2019; Dudley, 1981; Panter‐Brick, 1979), yet adequate answers are far from being offered to this question. The study of electoral manipulations focuses inter alia on the decisions made by the parties engaging in them (Nichter, 2008) but hardly accounts for the role of others and their competitors, who are usually committed to counteract such manipulations.…”

Election Administration, Resource Allocation, and Turnout: Evidence From Kenya

“… 9. This contrasts with Mexico (e.g., Ascencio & Rueda, 2019), Colombia, and Liberia (Bowles et al, 2020). …”

“…Election-day lines are but one manifestation of election administration. Election administration influences citizens’ experience at the voting booth (e.g., Claassen et al, 2013; Kerr, 2018), whether through the identity of polling officers and party representatives (e.g., Ascencio & Rueda, 2019; Neggers, 2018), finger inking on election day (e.g., Ferree et al, 2020), the number and location of polling places (e.g., Brady & McNulty, 2011; Haspel & Gibbs Knotts, 2005), or the kind of voting machine used to cast a ballot (e.g., Ansolabehere & Stewart, 2005). Here, I probe how policies that affect election-day lines can create systematic inequities for registered voters.…”