Beyond Free and Fair: Monitoring Elections and Building Democracy

Eric Bjornlund explores the history and evolution of international and domestic election monitoring and offers insight into how the international community can more successfully advance democracy around the world. He draws on worldwide experience since the mid-1980s — including case studies from Cambodia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Zimbabwe and of the influential election monitoring work of former president Jimmy Carter — to evaluate the contribution of election monitoring to democracy promotion and democratic change. The author argues that international assistance for elections and democratization should focus more on the long-term development of organizations, institutions, and processes than on short-term ends, such as assessing electoral administration to satisfy the passing interest of the international community.