Electoral Integrity

Election integrity is crucial for political representation. If elections are flawed, rigged, or fraudulent, there is no level playing field for parties and candidates contesting the electoral race, and voters’ preferences are unlikely to be translated truthfully into election outcomes. Election fraud directly affects the formation of preferences, as well as the translation of preferences into votes in the chain of representation, thereby undermining the capacity of elections to generate accountability and responsiveness. This chapter discusses what election integrity is and how it can be measured and provides a review of what we know and do not know yet about election integrity. It then zooms in on election integrity in established democracies, mapping the specific challenges to election integrity experienced by democracies in Europe, North America, and Oceania. The chapter concludes by discussing the implications of challenges to election integrity for the quality of political representation.