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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: PartyTime who wrote (51431)	10/24/2000 12:35:33 PM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

I found the Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. You are correct that some countries have astonishing rates of participation, even in Western Europe. But I could find no meaningful pattern. They mostly stop about '97, so the comparisons are between '96 and '97, except for Switzerland, where I use '95: Canada/percentage of registered voters voting--- 68% percentage of the voting age population voting--- 58% US/reg.voters--- 63%/VAP--- 47% UK/RV--- 71.5%/VAP--- 60.4% France/RV--- 68%/VAP--- 59.9% Switerland/RV--- 42.2%/VAP--- 35.7% These are the summary comments of the institute: Some of the most dramatic findings from the project include: High turnout is not solely the property of established democracies in the West. Of the top 10 countries in the 1990s only three were Western European democracies. Turnout across the globe rose steadily between 1945 and 1990 - increasing from 61% in the 1940s to 68% in the 1980s. But post-1990 the average has dipped back to 64%. Since 1945 Western Europe has maintained the highest average turnout (77%), and Latin America the lowest (53%), but turnout need not necessarily reflect regional wealth. North America and the Caribbean have the third lowest turnout rate, while Oceania and the former Soviet states of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and Central Eastern Europe are respectively second and third highest in the regional league table over this period. Voter turnout across the world is beginning to converge at a figure between half and three-quarters of the voting age population of any given country. Turnout in Western Europe and North America and the Caribbean has remained fairly constant over the last 50 years, while in the rest of the world the rates have fluctuated more widely. Turnout in South America and Asia has steadily climbed while Africa and the Middle East hit high points in the 1980s but since then has slipped back. The overall average turnout in the post-war period for established democracies is 73%, which contrasts with an average of 58% for all other countries. However, turnout rates in both established and non-established democracies have been converging over time. Out of the 81 countries which had first and subsequent elections between 1945 and 1997, the average turnout in first elections (61%) is actually lower than the average for subsequent elections (62%). This represents a mixed pattern backed up by the fact that turnout in 41 countries dropped between the first and second elections but turnout actually rose in another 40 countries. A low literacy does not necessarily mean a country's turnout rate will be low. There is no significant statistical correlation between literacy and voter turnout, although highly literate countries do, on average, have a somewhat higher level of voter turnout. Nevertheless, high illiteracy countries such as Angola and Ethiopia have achieved high turnout rates. idea.int