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Dreamer128 · 08-10-2004, 02:34 PM

Watching the US vote

The announcement on Monday that the United States has asked Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to send experts to monitor this November's presidential elections came as something of a surprise. The move follows the controversial vote in 2000, which finally brought George Bush to power after a battle over who had really won the ballot in the state of Florida. The US Supreme Court finally ruled that Mr Bush had beaten Al Gore, his Democratic Party rival, by a mere 537 votes in that state. However, the debate about voter registration and the equipment used to record votes has never really died away, and some have concerns about similar problems arising this year.

Radio Netherlands spoke to OSCE spokeswoman Urdur Gunnarsdottir, and asked her about the role of the team of observers in the upcoming US elections.

"Our mandate is to observe elections, and look at the process. We're looking at issues like the voter registration, the legislation, the voting itself. And, we try not to use the word ‘fair', because we don't like to pass on very simplistic judgements as to whether an election is valid or not. What we are doing is to give people an idea of how the election process is going and whether there are any problems. So that is what we are trying to do, and that's our mandate: basically to observe and to report on what we have seen. And we report publicly on what we have seen. But we don't vet elections, we don't give them a ‘yes' or a ‘no'."

RN: "But the public perception is that, because the elections of 2000 in the US were such a debacle, there are grave doubts about this year's elections; that the same thing could happen. Is there not a feeling that there's no smoke without fire?"

"Absolutely. Our role is to look into the details, into each part of the election. And there were problems; we all agree that there were problems in 2000. OSCE sent a very, very small group of people to the US, to the mid-term elections in 2002, to look at how the USA, or how the states had dealt with those particular problems. So, of course we are interested in this, and we looked at that, and we saw some efforts to actually correct those [problems]. Some worked, some needed some more work."

"Of course we [will] look at the places where there were problems [and] we'll look at the issues that proved to be problematic. Voting is a very sensitive issue; the voter has to be convinced that his or her vote is cast in secret and that it will count, that's the fundament of elections. Of course we are looking at that, but we are not passing simplistic yes or no judgements on the elections, we will look at each part for itself and report on that."

RN: "But there is the perception that the OSCE monitors traditionally are used in countries where democracy is so fragile that the country more or less can't handle the elections on its own. Is this not quite embarrassing for the United States?"
"This is a common perception, and not quite correct, because we often send monitors to so-called established democracies. Spain is a good example. We sent a small team to Spain in March. To some countries we send large missions, to others we send small missions or assessment teams. We have not decided the scope of this particular election monitoring, or where exactly we will go, what exactly we will look at, and how many people we will need for that, whether we need only election experts to look at some particular issues, or whether we want to have it on a larger scale. That will be determined in September."

RN: "In the meantime, much is being made of the fact that this mission will publish a report. How significant is such a report if it happens after the fact?"

"Well, they are there for public scrutiny […] we can't do it before, obviously, and we can't do it while it's happening because, well, what's the point of that?"

RN: "If I could interrupt, I can see a point if your team arrives in September and, for example, checks out voting precincts and sees that nothing has changed, that the machines are still being used and that they still have the same problems that they had in 2000, I could definitely see a point to publishing that information ahead of time."

"We don't know how we are going to be operating. We have not looked at presidential elections in the US before. It's absolutely impossible for me to predict what's going to happen and, therefore, how we are going to react to it. The only thing I can tell you is that we are going to look at this objectively, and we are going to look at this as thoroughly as we possibly can, and then we'll pass the judgement."

(rnw.nl)

08-10-2004, 02:34 PM	#1
Dreamer128 Dracolisk Join Date: March 21, 2001 Location: Europe Age: 40 Posts: 6,136	Watching the US vote The announcement on Monday that the United States has asked Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to send experts to monitor this November's presidential elections came as something of a surprise. The move follows the controversial vote in 2000, which finally brought George Bush to power after a battle over who had really won the ballot in the state of Florida. The US Supreme Court finally ruled that Mr Bush had beaten Al Gore, his Democratic Party rival, by a mere 537 votes in that state. However, the debate about voter registration and the equipment used to record votes has never really died away, and some have concerns about similar problems arising this year. Radio Netherlands spoke to OSCE spokeswoman Urdur Gunnarsdottir, and asked her about the role of the team of observers in the upcoming US elections. "Our mandate is to observe elections, and look at the process. We're looking at issues like the voter registration, the legislation, the voting itself. And, we try not to use the word ‘fair', because we don't like to pass on very simplistic judgements as to whether an election is valid or not. What we are doing is to give people an idea of how the election process is going and whether there are any problems. So that is what we are trying to do, and that's our mandate: basically to observe and to report on what we have seen. And we report publicly on what we have seen. But we don't vet elections, we don't give them a ‘yes' or a ‘no'." RN: "But the public perception is that, because the elections of 2000 in the US were such a debacle, there are grave doubts about this year's elections; that the same thing could happen. Is there not a feeling that there's no smoke without fire?" "Absolutely. Our role is to look into the details, into each part of the election. And there were problems; we all agree that there were problems in 2000. OSCE sent a very, very small group of people to the US, to the mid-term elections in 2002, to look at how the USA, or how the states had dealt with those particular problems. So, of course we are interested in this, and we looked at that, and we saw some efforts to actually correct those [problems]. Some worked, some needed some more work." "Of course we [will] look at the places where there were problems [and] we'll look at the issues that proved to be problematic. Voting is a very sensitive issue; the voter has to be convinced that his or her vote is cast in secret and that it will count, that's the fundament of elections. Of course we are looking at that, but we are not passing simplistic yes or no judgements on the elections, we will look at each part for itself and report on that." RN: "But there is the perception that the OSCE monitors traditionally are used in countries where democracy is so fragile that the country more or less can't handle the elections on its own. Is this not quite embarrassing for the United States?" "This is a common perception, and not quite correct, because we often send monitors to so-called established democracies. Spain is a good example. We sent a small team to Spain in March. To some countries we send large missions, to others we send small missions or assessment teams. We have not decided the scope of this particular election monitoring, or where exactly we will go, what exactly we will look at, and how many people we will need for that, whether we need only election experts to look at some particular issues, or whether we want to have it on a larger scale. That will be determined in September." RN: "In the meantime, much is being made of the fact that this mission will publish a report. How significant is such a report if it happens after the fact?" "Well, they are there for public scrutiny […] we can't do it before, obviously, and we can't do it while it's happening because, well, what's the point of that?" RN: "If I could interrupt, I can see a point if your team arrives in September and, for example, checks out voting precincts and sees that nothing has changed, that the machines are still being used and that they still have the same problems that they had in 2000, I could definitely see a point to publishing that information ahead of time." "We don't know how we are going to be operating. We have not looked at presidential elections in the US before. It's absolutely impossible for me to predict what's going to happen and, therefore, how we are going to react to it. The only thing I can tell you is that we are going to look at this objectively, and we are going to look at this as thoroughly as we possibly can, and then we'll pass the judgement." (rnw.nl)