A few reflections on the actuality of the election standards developed by the Venice Commission

Abstract

Democracy, alongside human rights and the rule of law, is one of the three pillars of Europe’s constitutional heritage. Democracy is not imaginable without elections conducted in accordance with certain principles that give them their democratic status. These principles constitute a specific aspect of Europe’s constitutional heritage, which can be referred to as the “European electoral heritage.” This heritage has two aspects: 1) a hard core of constitutional principles of electoral law, such as universal, equal, free, secret, and direct elections; 2) the fundamental conditions of a democratic state governed by the rule of law, such as fundamental rights, the stability of electoral law, and effective procedural safeguards. According to the Venice Commission’s standards set out in its Guidelines, compliance with the fundamental principles of European electoral heritage is essential in any democracy. However, it is not enough for electoral law (in the narrow sense of the term) to contain provisions that are consistent with European electoral principles: the latter must be placed in their context, and the credibility of the electoral process must be guaranteed. Two conditions are therefore essential: 1) the stability of the rules must be ensured to rule out any suspicion of manipulation, 2) the procedural framework must allow for the effective implementation of the established rules.
Voting procedures play a crucial role in the entire electoral process, as it is during the act of voting that electoral manipulation most often occurs. As the Commission writes, “it is during voting that election fraud is most likely to occur.” Only transparency, impartiality, and independence from politically motivated manipulation will ensure the proper management of the electoral process, from the pre-election period to the end of the results processing.
The elements of the Guidelines developed by the Commission are an attempt to find the most optimal solutions, a common standard that best reflects social preferences in democratic societies and the free expression of will, as well as the use of all votes cast. However, it is important that politicians, taking into account the Venice Commission’s Guidelines, better understand the implications of their choices, including those resulting from mathematics (counting methods, division of constituencies, etc.). The Guidelines developed by the Commission create a framework that must be filled with content in a specific country.