Explaining the African Vote

该奖项是根据 2009 年《美国复苏和再投资法案》（公法 111-5）提供资金的。尽管为促进非洲民主化的项目投入了数百万美元，但捐助者仍然不了解非洲大陆政治最重要的方面之一：为什么非洲人会以自己的方式投票？ 大多数非洲选举观察家认为这一过程仅仅是种族统计：所有公民都投票给自己的种族群体，无论现任政府的表现如何，也不考虑当前的问题。 然而，没有足够的证据支持这一观点。 在绝大多数非洲国家，单一民族无法获得多数选票。 民族联盟经常破裂和更替，同一民族的政治家可能是不同政党的成员。 非洲国家的政治中的种族重要性差异很大，选举在某些情况下会产生暴力，但在其他情况下则不会。 此外，我们对非洲选民动机的了解仍然模糊，主要基于轶事报告、对少数（未经科学选择的）案例的研究，或衡量态度而不是实际选举行为的调查。 令人惊讶的是，到目前为止，很少有学者使用最有力的工具来衡量投票选择：出口民意调查。调查人员计划探索纳米比亚投票的决定因素，纳米比亚是一个正在转型的民主国家，以一个占主导地位的种族群体为特色：纳米比亚的奥万博人代表了近一半的人口。 学者和政策制定者认为纳米比亚正在走向稳定的民主。 然而，自独立以来，单一政党（SWAPO）一直主导着政治。 这种主导地位在多大程度上是基于种族主张，以及在多大程度上是基于绩效或问题评估？ 了解选民的动机为更深入地了解非洲政治开辟了道路，并有助于传达学术观点以及民主促进方面仍然存在的挑战（或不存在）。该项目将通过在该领域安置四名研究生和一名本科生来产生更广泛的影响。 他们通过帮助构建、管理和分析这次出口民意调查获得的知识是推进课堂之外的培训所必需的。对于其中两名学生来说，这将是他们第一次来到非洲。对于所有人来说，这将是他们第一次参与生成科学生成的定量原始数据。这项全国性的演习还将有助于纳米比亚数百名普查员的参与和培训。最后，民意调查还可以对官方选举结果进行另一次检查，鉴于纳米比亚选举委员会在进行自由和公正的选举方面面临挑战，官方选举结果可能不可靠。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).Despite pouring millions of dollars into programs to further the democratization of Africa, donors remain uninformed about one of the most important facets of politics on the continent: Why do Africans vote they way they do? Most observers of African elections view the process as a mere ethnic headcount: all citizens vote for their own ethnic group regardless of the performance of the incumbent government and without reference to the issues of the day. Yet there is scant evidence to support this view. In the vast majority of African countries a single ethnic group cannot achieve a majority of the votes. Ethnic coalitions break down and shift frequently and politicians from the same ethnic group are members of different political parties. The salience of ethnicity to politics in African countries varies widely and elections produce violence in some cases but not others. Moreover, our knowledge of the motivations of African voters remains murky, based primarily upon anecdotal reports, studies of a small number of (unscientifically selected) cases, or surveys that measure attitudes but not actual electoral behavior. Surprisingly, few scholars up to this point have employed the most powerful tool to measure vote choice: the exit poll. The investigators plan to explore the determinants of voting in Namibia, a transitioning democracy that features a dominant ethnic group: the Ovambo in Namibia represent nearly half the population. Scholars and policymakers consider Namibia to be on its way to stable democracy. However, a single party (SWAPO) has dominated politics since independence. To what extent is this dominance based on ethnic claims, and to what extent of performance or issue evaluations? Understanding the motivations of its voters opens the way to a deeper understanding of African politics, and help to inform scholarly opinion and the challenges (or not) that remain with respect to democracy promotion. This project will have broader impacts by placing four graduate students and one undergraduate student in the field. The knowledge they will receive through helping to construct, manage, and analyze this exit poll is required to advance training beyond the classroom. For two of the students, it will be their first experience in Africa. For all, it will be the first time they are involved in generating quantitative scientifically produced primary data. This nation-wide exercise will also help in the participation and training of hundreds of enumerators in Namibia. Finally, the poll can also provide another check on the official electoral results which may prove unreliable given the challenges faced by the Namibian electoral commission to conduct a free and fair election.