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The Effect of Election Administration on VoterConfidence: A Local Matter?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 October 2007

Lonna Rae Atkeson  and
Kyle L. Saunders
Lonna Rae Atkeson
Affiliation:
University of New Mexico
Kyle L. Saunders
Affiliation:
Colorado State University
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Extract

The 2000 presidential election was a wake-up call to elected leaders,public officials, and election scholars. The electoral fiasco—mostprominent in Florida, but also taking place in states like NewMexico and Ohio—revealed many deficiencies in voting equipment(Caltech/MIT Voting Technology Project 2001). In addition to faultyequipment, registration mix-ups and problems with absentee ballotsled to the loss of as many as six million votes (Caltech/MIT VotingTechnology Project 2001). Confusing ballots, like the butterflyballot in Florida's Dade County, were found to have led voters tovote incorrectly (Wand et al. 2001). While these problems have, nodoubt, existed for a long time, the closeness of the 2000presidential race and the fact that the number of lost votes had thepower to change the election outcome have brought electionadministration questions to the forefront of policy making.Results were first presented at “TheFuture of Election Reform and Ethics in the States,” hosted byKent State University, Department of Political Science,Columbus, Ohio, January 16–17, 2007, and the following paper waspresented at the Midwest Political Science Association's AnnualMeeting, Chicago, Illinois, April 12–15, 2007. Data werecollected by monies generously provided by the University of NewMexico's Research Allocation Committee. We'd like to thankLuciana Zilberman, Lisa Bryant, Alex Adams, David Magleby, andthe Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy at BrighamYoung University for their assistance with this project. Ofcourse, any errors are our own.

Information

Type
SYMPOSIUM
Information
PS: Political Science & Politics , Volume 40 , Issue 4 , October 2007 , pp. 655 - 660
Copyright
© 2007 The American Political Science Association

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