The science, suspicion, and sustainability of opinion polls

Abstract

<p>The past 30 years have seen political surveys, particularly those related to elections, evolve from an occasional novelty to a staple feature of the Kenyan political scene. This chapter considers several issues with regard to these surveys. These include: (1) the practical challenges in conducting them as well as recent technological advances; (2) the reasons why a high level of suspicion is often attached to election polls in particular, and the main rhetorical forms that such suspicion takes; and, (3) several factors likely to affect the future of such surveys, beyond the widespread awareness of and considerable public support for them, especially the attitudes of those in, and aspiring to, power. It concludes by suggesting that the recent “proliferation” of such polls is no guarantee of their continuation.</p>

Transition to subnational democracy: Kenya’s 2017 presidential and gubernatorial elections

“…In the disputed 2007 elections, for example, an exit-poll was felt by experts to greatly enhance the ability to verify results, though at that time the exit-poll's results were unfortunately withheld. Nevertheless, they have since been understood to have contradicted the electoral commission's narrative that the incumbent, Mwai Kibaki, was fairly re-elected, and so helped evidence concerns at the time with the official tally (Cheeseman 2008;Wolf 2020). While all polling has drawbacks, the general advantage is that one can ask which way the respondent voted (a factual question), rather than the future way a respondent is likely to vote, as is done in opinion polls ahead of election day.…”

Public Perception of Political Opinion Polls and Their Influence on People’s Voting Behavior: The Case of Mwanza City Residents

“…According to Marsh (1985), the term ''bandwagon'' refers to a situation in which some individuals adopt a majority position out of a desire to be in the majority. This view is also supported by scholars such as Rothschild and Malhotra (2014) and Wolf (2020), who argue that most people believe that opinion polls can affect voters since the media hype regularly attracts them. Therefore, releasing poll result can encourage people to jump on a bandwagon.…”

“…People use newspapers to influence other voters by showing them the published poll results. The public attention is drawn to news about public opinion polls by media sensationalism (Wolf, 2020). The results indicate that the level of awareness among voters about political opinion polls has increased as the media use their results as a source of news.…”