The impact of elections: voting, political behaviour and democracy in sub-Saharan Africa

这项研究项目分析了撒哈拉以南非洲地区参差不齐的选举历史。虽然非洲大陆大部分地区的选票仍然与腐败、暴力和政治不稳定有关，但一些国家最近的选举显然证实了民主过渡。该项目结合了历史学和政治学的技术，将重新审视个人的选举经历与其政治态度和行为之间的关系。特定的选举经历是否使个人倾向于拒绝舞弊，或者接受，甚至要求舞弊？如果是这样的话，选民是否会成为民主巩固的障碍之一和推动者？该项目将把重点放在三个政治和选举历史截然不同的非洲国家--加纳、肯尼亚和乌干达。我们的调查结果将促进对这三个国家和其他国家民主化的更多了解，并将为政策制定者和从业人员继续努力通过自由和公平的选举促进透明和负责任的政府提供信息。这个比较项目将历史学家和政治学家的团队聚集在一起，询问为什么选举在某些地方和时间比其他地方和时间效果更好。它的目的是测试选举质量在多大程度上受到民众预期和要求的影响，并挑战糟糕的选举完全是国家官员不民主态度的产物的观点。它考虑不同类型的选举经历如何导致个人有不同的政治态度和期望，并调查反舞弊态度和良好选举做法的演变何时以及如何支持民主巩固的良性循环。我们的主要目标之一是展示这种循环是如何形成的，以便我们能够展示如何在以前的威权环境中鼓励巩固民主的积极经验。该项目涵盖了大约60年的历史，从刚刚独立前的选举到现在。它覆盖了三个国家-肯尼亚、乌干达和加纳。这些国家的殖民制度遗产相似：都是英国领土，在殖民统治的最后几年迅速制定了选举制度--但它们在独立后的历史上有很大不同。他们现在都实行得票最多的选举制度和多党选举制度，但民主巩固的程度截然不同。我们的研究将使用多种研究技术来询问不同的材料，从档案记录到定性访谈，再到定量调查数据和尖端的实验室工作。这将使项目小组能够专注于选举本身的进程，以及这些进程如何揭示和重塑关于政治行动的想法。选举过去是--现在也是--吸引了大量民众，消耗了大量的国家和公共资源和能源。但它们也是经过谈判的事件，是国际、国家、有时甚至非常地方性影响的产物。虽然选举的做法通常是统一和一致的，但选民、政治家和选举官员的经历实际上在任何特定的选举中和在不同的时间都有所不同。利用这一创新的研究方法组合，该项目将对学术辩论作出重大贡献，并将通过与政策制定者的持续接触和及时制作针对政府、国际机构和研究用户需求的简报，实现一致的高级别政策参与。因此，该项目将为参与整个非洲大陆选举的一系列参与者提供信息。

This research project analyses the chequered history of elections in sub-Saharan Africa. While ballots in much of the continent continue to be linked to corruption, violence and political instability, recent elections in some countries have apparently confirmed a democratic transition. Combining the techniques of history and political science, the project will re-examine the relationship between an individual's experience of elections and their political attitudes and behaviours. Do particular experiences of elections predispose individuals to reject malpractice or, alternatively to accept, or even demand it? If so, do voters become one of the barriers to, as well as the agents of democratic consolidation? The project will focus on three African countries whose political and electoral histories have been very different - Ghana, Kenya and Uganda. Our findings will foster greater understanding of democratisation in these three countries and beyond, and will inform the continued efforts of policy-makers and practitioners to promote transparent and accountable government through free and fair elections. This comparative project brings a team of historians and political scientists together to ask why it is that elections work better in some places and times than others. It aims to test the extent to which the quality of elections is shaped by popular expectations and demands, and challenges the idea that poor elections are solely the product of the undemocratic attitudes of state officials. It considers how different sorts of electoral experiences can lead individuals to have different political attitudes and expectations, and investigates when and how the evolution of anti-rigging attitudes and good electoral practice supports positive cycles of democratic consolidation. One of our key aims is to demonstrate how such cycles come into being so that we can show how positive experiences of democratic consolidation can be encouraged in previously authoritarian contexts.The project covers about sixty years of history, from the immediate pre-independence elections to the present day. It covers three countries - Kenya, Uganda and Ghana. These were similar in their institutional colonial legacy: all were British territories, which saw the rapid elaboration of an electoral system in the very last years of colonial rule - but their post-independence histories differed substantially. All now share first-past-the-post and multi-party electoral systems, but with very different levels of democratic consolidation.Our research will use multiple research techniques to interrogate a diverse body of material, from archival records to qualitative interviews to quantitative survey data and cutting-edge 'laboratory' work. This will allow the project team to focus on the processes of the elections themselves, and how these have both revealed and remade ideas about political action. Elections were - and are - performances which draw in vast numbers of people, and consume vast state and public resources and energy. But they are also negotiated events, the product of influences that are international, national and sometimes very local. Although the practice of election is typically intended to be uniform and consistent, the experience of voters and of politicians and election officials actually varies within any given election, and across time. Drawing on this innovative combination of research methods, the project will make a major contribution to academic debates, and will achieve consistent high-level policy engagement through consistent engagement with policy-makers and timely production of briefings tailored to the needs of governments, international agencies and research users. As a result, the project will inform a range of players involved in the making and remaking of elections across the continent.