Analyses of the recent Scottish elections have criticised the system of proportional representation (PR), the holding of different elections on the same day, the use of one ballot paper for different purposes and the failures of an electronic system. There have also been derogatory references to a bungled performance, more akin to a "Third World" electoral system than one to be expected in Scotland.
In the light of such discussion, it is worth looking at the recent electoral experience of one so-called Third World country which uses PR, combines elections for a wide range of office on a single ballot and is wholly electronic. I refer to the fifth biggest country in the world and the fourth largest democracy, Brazil.
In October 2002, President Lula (pictured on an election poster) became the first working man to be directly elected as president of a republic in any country of Latin America. While voting for president, Brazil's electorate of 115 million had to vote, on the same ballot, for state governor, two senators and federal and state deputies. Over 94.3 million people voted. They did so in the world's largest wholly electronic vote, with nearly two million people administering 406,000 electronic ballot boxes across the vastness of Brazil, including two of the world's biggest metropolitan areas and the Amazon region.
The system was impressively efficient, with the percentage of null, blank and spoiled votes lower than under the old manual system. Over 90% of the results were declared before midnight on polling day. International commentators were quick to praise Brazil's achievement, not least in the United States, where it was compared with its own unseemly experience with "hanging chads" in the 2000 election of President Bush.
In October 2004, there was a similar performance in nationwide municipal elections for mayors and town councillors. In, once again, the world's biggest totally electronic vote, the electorate, now 119,821,569, voted for 5563 mayors and 51,748 councillors. The most important municipality was the city of Sao Paulo, with an electorate of 7,771,503, half as big again as the total population of Scotland.
Most recently, there were the elections of October 2006, re-electing President Lula, though without the high hopes of 2002. The electorate, now 125.9 million, voted in 91,000 voting stations, equipped with 380,900 electronic booths, again, for the whole range of offices. The state of Sao Paulo alone, with 28 million voters, had 16 candidates for governor, 19 for senate, and 2800 for federal and state chambers. After a hard-fought campaign, more than 90% of the results for major posts were known by midnight.
How far Brazil's success in these three recent elections compares with Scotland's experience of May 3 is open to debate. Brazilians over 18 are obliged to vote: those between 16 and 18 may choose to do so. Another reason for high turnout is that Brazilians value their vote, not least after 21 years of a military-backed regime. The Brazilian electorate is overwhelmingly young, poor and relatively badly educated, certainly by comparison with Scotland, but poverty and lack of education do not prevent voters from making shrewd assessments of politicians and their performance.
Their handling of the detailed process of computer voting is more difficult to understand, since to complete it in 2006 required a mini-mum of 21 entries: but, apparently, they cope, including indigenous people. One clue may be that those responsible for the elections provide detailed, remorselessly repeated instructions in newspapers, magazines and, above all, on television. The relatively few null, void and spoiled votes suggest that the message is being received.
As for a "Third World" electoral system, contrast the millions of electronic returns to Brasilia, from the Amazon to the frontier with Argentina, by midnight on polling day, with, more locally, a helicopter grounded by fog and ballot boxes arriving, late and wet, on a boat from Arran. - Peter Flynn, Emeritus Professor of Latin American Studies, University of Glasgow, Broomhill, Glasgow.
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