International conference on ‘Role, Framework & Capacity’ of Election Management Bodies

The Election Commission of India (ECI) is going to conduct an International Conference on ‘Role, Framework & Capacity of Election Management Bodies (EMBs)’ in New Delhi starting from 31 October, 2022.

Key Highlights of the event:

• It is going to be a two-day conference and will be inaugurated by Chief Election Commissioner of India Rajiv Kumar.
• The countries like Greece, Mauritius, and the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) have been invited as co-leads.
• The Election Commission (EC) has also invited the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), apart from EMBs and governmental counterparts dealing with the conduct of elections worldwide, for the event.
• Objective: As part of the ‘Summit for Democracy’ Year of Action, India, through the EC, is leading the Cohort on Election Integrity aimed at sharing its knowledge, technical expertise, and experiences with other democracies around the world.
• Participants: There are nearly 50 participants from 11 EMBs from nations including Armenia, Mauritius, Nepal, Cabo Verde, Australia, Chile, and Federal States of Micronesia, Greece, Philippines, São Tomé & Príncipe.
• Points to be discussed:
• The first two sessions will have discussions on the current and future challenges for EMBs with respect to their role and framework to ensure ‘election integrity’ while the session on the following day will focus on the ‘Capacity of EMBs’.

What are Election Management Bodies (EMBs)?

• An EMB is an organization or body that has the sole purpose of, and is legally responsible for, managing some or all of the elements that are essential for the conduct of elections and direct democracy instruments—such as referendums, citizens’ initiatives, and recall votes—if those are part of the legal framework.

Need for EMBs:

• The complexity and specialist skills necessary for electoral management require that an institution or institution be responsible for electoral activities.
• Such bodies have a variety of shapes and sizes, with a wide range of titles to match, such as the Election Commission, Department of Elections, Electoral Council, Election Unit, or Electoral Board.
• The term electoral management body (EMB) has been coined to refer to the body or bodies responsible for electoral management, regardless of the wider institutional framework in place.

These essential (or core) elements include:

• Determining who is eligible to vote;
• Receiving and validating the nominations of electoral participants (for elections, political parties, and/or candidates);
• Conducting polling;
• Counting the votes; and
• Tabulating the votes.

Few Other Roles:

• In addition to these essential elements, an EMB may undertake other tasks that assist in the conduct of elections and direct democracy instruments, such as voter registration, boundary delimitation, voter education and information, media monitoring, and electoral dispute resolution.

What can be said of Election Management Bodies?

• A body that has no electoral responsibilities other than, for example, boundary delimitation (such as a boundary delimitation commission), electoral dispute resolution (such as an electoral court), election media monitoring (such as a media monitoring commission), or the conduct of voter education and information (such as a civic education commission) is not considered an EMB because it is not managing any of the essential elements identified above.
• Similarly, a national population or statistics bureau that produces electoral registers as part of the general process of population registration is not considered to be an EMB.