Why do some electoral commissions earn public trust while others collapse under pressure? Why Elections Need Parties offers a sharp and timely exploration of how democracies succeed or stumble at the ballot box. Drawing on more than a decade of fieldwork, elite interviews, and archival research across Latin America and Africa, Alejandro Trelles uncovers the institutional and political forces that determine whether electoral management bodies (EMBs) gain real autonomy or become vulnerable to manipulation. Trelles develops a new theory of partisan inclusion to show how party engagement, transparency, and accountability can strengthen, rather than weaken, electoral governance. Through vivid country cases and rich comparative analysis, this book demonstrates how institutional design, consultation mechanisms, and administrative practice shape election quality and democratic resilience.
Loading metrics...
* Views captured on Cambridge Core between #date#. This data will be updated every 24 hours.
Usage data cannot currently be displayed.
This section outlines the accessibility features of this content - including support for screen readers, full keyboard navigation and high-contrast display options. This may not be relevant for you.
The HTML of this book complies with version 2.2 of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), offering more comprehensive accessibility measures for a broad range of users and attains the highest (AAA) level of WCAG compliance, optimising the user experience by meeting the most extensive accessibility guidelines.
Allows you to navigate directly to chapters, sections, or non‐text items through a linked table of contents, reducing the need for extensive scrolling.
Provides an interactive index, letting you go straight to where a term or subject appears in the text without manual searching.
You will encounter all content (including footnotes, captions, etc.) in a clear, sequential flow, making it easier to follow with assistive tools like screen readers.
You get concise descriptions (for images, charts, or media clips), ensuring you do not miss crucial information when visual or audio elements are not accessible.
You get more than just short alt text: you have comprehensive text equivalents, transcripts, captions, or audio descriptions for substantial non‐text content, which is especially helpful for complex visuals or multimedia.
You can access graphs or charts in a text or tabular format, so you are not excluded if you cannot process visual displays.
You benefit from high‐contrast text, which improves legibility if you have low vision or if you are reading in less‐than‐ideal lighting conditions.