The Year in Elections, 2014

In many countries, polling day ends with disputes about ballot-box fraud, corruption, and flawed registers. Which claims are legitimate? And which are false complaints from sore losers? This report by the Electoral Integrity Project, based at Harvard and the University of Sydney, evaluates the quality of elections held around the world. Based on a rolling survey collecting the views of 1,429 election experts, the research provides independent and reliable evidence to compare whether countries meet international standards of electoral integrity. The rolling survey results presented in this report cover 127 national parliamentary and presidential contests held worldwide in 107 countries from 1 July 2012 to 31 December 2014. The report found that the five best elections during 2014 were Lithuania, Costa Rica, Sweden, Slovenia and Uruguay. The five worst contests in 2014 were Egypt, Mozambique, Afghanistan, Bahrain and Syria. The 2014 US Congressional elections were rated as worst in comparison with all other established democracies.