RAPID: International Election Observation and Perceptions of Election Credibility

2014年6月25日，突尼斯宣布将于2014年10月26日举行革命后的首次议会选举，并于2014年11月23日举行革命后的首次总统选举。该项目旨在评估选举观察员如何影响公民对这些选举的政治态度和行为。来自国际和国内组织的选举观察员试图通过出席选举和就选举质量发表公开报告来提高公众对选举的信心。先前的研究表明，当地公民对选举可信度的看法可能会以各种方式影响他们的政治参与，从促进民主参与和选民投票率到增加抗议和选举暴力的可能性。因此，选举观察员可能通过对选举可信度信念的影响，对民主化与和平产生显著影响。鉴于自2011年以来中东和北非的政治事件，本研究提出的知识对该地区的和平与稳定具有重要意义。特别是，这些知识可以帮助决策者和参与冲突后重建的国际非政府组织了解情况。这个项目将在突尼斯立法和总统选举的小组调查中嵌入实验，这两个选举将分别在2014年10月26日和11月23日举行。这些实验将在10月26日选举后立即进行的全国代表性调查中，向随机选择的公民提供有关选举观察员在场的信息和报告。选举观察员的身份（美国、欧洲、国内）和报告的内容（正面或负面）将会发生变化。该项目的结果将包括公民对10月26日选举可信度的看法，以及他们在11月23日选举期间和之后的选举投票率、投票选择和其他政治行为（例如抗议）。后一种结果将在11月23日大选后立即由同一组受访者进行的选后调查来衡量。因此，如果选举观察员影响选举可信度的感知，那么本项目也将能够首次使用因果中介分析来估计选举观察员如何通过对选举可信度的信念影响一系列其他未来政治行为。

On June 25, 2014, Tunisia announced that it will hold its first post-revolution parliamentary election on October 26, 2014, and its first post-revolution presidential election on November 23, 2014. This project seeks to evaluate how election observers affect citizens' political attitudes and behaviors around these elections. Election observers, which come from both international and domestic organizations, seek to improve public confidence in elections through their presence at elections and their public reports on election quality. Previous research suggests that local citizens' perceptions of elections' credibility may affect their political participation in a myriad of ways, from promoting democratic engagement and voter turnout to increasing the likelihood of protest and election violence. Thus, election observers may have significant effects on democratization and peace through their effects on beliefs about election credibility. Given the political events in the Middle East and North Africa since 2011, the knowledge produced from this proposed study has great relevance for peace and stability in the region. In particular, the knowledge can help to inform policymakers and international non-governmental organizations that are involved in post-conflict re-construction . This project will embed experiments in a panel survey around Tunisia's legislative and presidential elections, which will occur on October 26, 2014, and November 23, 2014, respectively. The experiments will deliver information about election observers' presence and reports at the October 26th election to randomly selected citizens in a nationally representative survey conducted immediately following that election. Factors that will be varied include the identity of election observers (U.S., European, or domestic) and the content of their reports (positive or negative). The project's outcomes will include citizens' perceptions of the credibility of the October 26th election as well as their election turnout, vote choice, and other political behaviors (e.g., protest) during and after the November 23rd election. The latter outcomes will be measured via a post-election survey with the same panel of respondents immediately following the November 23rd election. Thus, if election observers affect perceptions of election credibility, then this project will also be able to estimate how election observers affect a range of other future political behaviors via beliefs about election credibility for the first time using causal mediation analysis.