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18 Election L.J. 1 (2019)

handle is hein.journals/enlwjr18 and id is 1 raw text is: Original Articles ELECTION LAW JOURNAL Volume 18, Number 1, 2019 © Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. DOI: 10.1089/elj.2017.0479 Flawed Laws, Flawed Elections: Local Elections in Pakistan Hassan Nasir Mirbahar ABSTRACT Violations of electoral integrity occur throughout the electoral cycle. This article focuses on violations that take place in the legal framework for elections and examines what happens when election laws fail to meet international/universal standards of electoral integrity. Using case studies of local government elections in Pakistan, this article shows how violations of electoral integrity within the legal framework impacted the conduct of elections, rendering local elections controversial. This article argues that violations of electoral integrity standards within election law also affect electoral administration and management. It shows how violations of electoral integrity standards within the legal framework broke down the electoral processes for local government elections. Local elections are a huge exercise in Pakistan: the last cycle involved elections to about 80,000 seats in four provinces, and around 87 million voters were called to choose representatives for these seats. Electoral exercises of such magnitude are linked with the overall political stability of the country, hence local elections deserve attention from both practitioners and scholars. Keywords: electoral integrity, electoral laws, electoral standards INTRODUCTION A S ELECTIONS CONSTITUTE A BEDROCK of de- mocracy, electoral laws lay down the founda- tion for conducting them. Electoral laws, the rules of the game, should provide a level playing field to all actors and clearly define provisions for all as- pects of the play. Everyone involved in an election should be aware about legal provisions and be cer- tain as to how an electoral process will unfold. Therefore, electoral laws can be used to strengthen electoral integrity and promote inclusiveness in the electoral processes. At the same time, incumbent governments can manipulate electoral laws, de jure and de facto, to disenfranchise voters, to dis- qualify candidates and even to attain the outcome they desire. If electoral laws are structured to im- prove the quality of elections, they can help increase confidence in an electoral process, whereas unjust laws will diminish confidence and lead to electoral conflicts (Birch 2010; DRI 2014b; Mozzafar and Schedler 2002; Norris et al. 2015). Hence, the elec- toral laws can play a pivotal role in securing or obstructing electoral integrity and generating posi- tive or negative political consequences of elections. Existing scholarly work on electoral laws can be divided into three big streams. First, scholars have ex- amined the causes of electoral laws and how they are reformed. Here scholars have been intrigued by ques- tions such as why and how electoral laws are changed, investigating the politics surrounding electoral laws (see, for example, Renwick 2010). Second, a large body of literature has studied the consequences of electoral laws, i.e., how electoral laws affect a polity; here scholars have considered varying results that electoral laws produce. As an ex- ample, some scholars have tried to support Duverger's Hassan Nasir Mirbahar is a democratic governance analyst based in Pakistan, and has worked in Pakistan, Myanmar, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. He is the former Pakistan country representative at Democracy Reporting International and holds a master's degree in human rights and democratiza- tion from the University of Sydney in Australia. 1

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