Today was voting day for the german federal state of Northrhine-Westphalia - the most densely populated state.

In every town and village of that state dozens of polling stations were set up, usually withing walking distance. Voting took place from 10 am to 6 pm and there were no waiting lines to be seen.
Complete absence of voter harrassment, misleading information or discrimination.
Everyone knew exactly when and where to go to ... mostly because every citizen got a letter telling them where to go and what to bring (election voting card and ID - every German has a 'Personalausweis'. Mandatory. Doesn't cost much either.).

No voting machines anywhere. Banned by the Federal Constitutional Court (Bundesverfassungsgericht).
Why? Because every citizen must be able to check the correctness of the voting process without requiring him to possess any special technical knowledge. Or short: Transparency and accountability.
Good old cardboard boxes and paper slips and lots of voluntary manpower. We never vote when an important football game is happening.

At 6pm the voting stations closes and the votes are counted and the result phoned in to the 'Rathaus' (aka city hall, very clean, no rodents anywhere). Those numbers make up the preliminary results. I'm not sure if the votes get counted a second time or if they do that only in case the results are close. But they always got a notary at hand, so everything is nice and proper.

And finally the paper ballot. It is practically impossible to mess it up, but some manage to do it anyway. Most people make their Xs inside the circle, but even if you paint a smiley inside it, it's still counted as a correct vote as long as it smiles in the correct place. Election helpers are encouraged to guess the "voter's intent".
You have two votes. One for the district candidate (on the left) and one for the party.

Anyway, voting is easy, transparent, accountable, fast and so organized that we can't really understand why other less experienced countries and the USA struggle so much with the process. It's downright boring here! No nuts telling us that "God wants you to vote the Christian Democratic Union (CDU)" either.
Oh, and all results are either downloadable from the federal state website or presented in other ways. like this: http://karten.wahlergebnisse.nrw.de/WahlClient/

Cheers and Arrr!

http://i.minus.com/jbbdK28EEgN5f2.JPG (http://minus.com/lbbdK28EEgN5f2)

http://www.civforum.de/images/smilies/picard.gif@Thread and OP

http://www.civforum.de/images/smilies/picard.gif@Thread and OP

This.

Aroddo, while i do agree with some of the points in your post and actually find them somewhat significant, i am confident that those among our American friends who do care already know this.
So essentially you are kind of trolling people with a wikipedia entry here.
Oh and good job how you brushed over the authoritarian ID nonsense we got ourselves into. I guess i'll be repeatedly fined once 2017 comes around. (I should have renewed my ID in order to go for the full 12/2020...).

Btw: Did you guys answer the Neo-Nazis-in-Germany question in the thread in the Tavern?
Doing so, and doing so comprehensively, should be a priority, at least compared to... this.

More btw: I guess i should update "my" German electoral politics thread when i (finally) have the time.

Oh, and indeed: Arrr!
And finally the paper ballot. It is practically impossible to mess it up, but some manage to do it anyway.
Actually many people do so intentionally. It's the non-brown "none of the above" of the age before joke parties (Die PARTEI etc.).
And yes, that's very different from not voting at all.

So... What's this thread about?

What are those 2 votes for? I'm not sure what a wahlkreis is, but the one on the right is for the federal parliament?

Re: Voting machines
It's the same here in the Netherlands, and rightly so. The voting process must be as simple and transparant as possible.
We've used voting computers until 8 years ago or something and then the government banned them.

Eh, somewhat similar process here (in Australia). Except we don't have voting cards and we aren't told to vote (provided it's inside the electorate boundaries). I just use my drivers license. We also postpone elections for football. And there's some 'voter caging' but mostly it revolves around me chatting to friends handing out 'how to vote' cards for the various parties. We also pay our election people (not altogether awful money either) to do it.

Here's our ballot papers.

http://www.aec.gov.au/voting/How_to_vote/files/senate-ballot-btl.gif

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_KORr-hCPEVM/TTnTo8jgBbI/AAAAAAAAAhA/TKr78BGADVE/s1600/ballot-alt2.jpg

New Zealand's is a mixed member proportional setup which is fairly similar to Germany's system. It however has a separate Maori list, Maori can vote on.

I do not really understand the purpose of this thread. Although I have guessed the OP wants to share a few good points about German voting and how unfathomable that American messes it up. Weird.

Anyway for the purpose of comparison here is a British polling card:

http://i46.tinypic.com/2sacv3s.jpg

For flavour, here's the voting ballot in the Netherlands, it's quite large, only about a quarter is visible here.
It are the parties from left to right and in the columns are the people in that party whom you can vote for. Yo choose only one. No numbering, no choosing multiple people or parties (that will invalidate your ballot).

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/76/NL_Stemmen2.jpg/800px-NL_Stemmen2.jpg

Oh, and in the Netherlands we also postpone elections for important football matches. And summer holidays.
(Our government collapsed in april, we could have elections in june, but it's the european football championships then, so that's a no-go, and after that it's the summer holidays and the Olympics, so now the elections are in september... Hmmm)

I like how the Brits have to have pictures to make sure their voters understand the party they're voting for.

Aroddo, while i do agree with some of the points in your post and actually find them somewhat significant, i am confident that those among our American friends who do care already know this.
So essentially you are kind of trolling people with a wikipedia entry here.

Oh and good job how you brushed over the authoritarian ID nonsense we got ourselves into. I guess i'll be repeatedly fined once 2017 comes around. (I should have renewed my ID in order to go for the full 12/2020...).

Well ... kinda, I guess. On the other hand our American friends seem to take too many infractions on their civil rights for granted while on the other hand they take tremendous issue with things like the ID.
For example, in many states convicted felons get their right to vote taken from them permanently while the number of incarcerations for minor misdemeanors go rapidly up all while minorities like blacks or latinos are specifically targeted - groups who are majorly voting democratic. What I see is the erosion of civil rights for party politics.

And I really don't understand the issues some have with ID. Every citizen is registered anyway for the purpose of taxation, social security and driving. So what if you have an ID that can also be used to validate with state guarantee that you are who you are?



Btw: Did you guys answer the Neo-Nazis-in-Germany question in the thread in the Tavern?
Doing so, and doing so comprehensively, should be a priority, at least compared to... this.

Actually yes, we did. Extensively. Funny you should ask here instead of reading that there.


For flavour, here's the voting ballot in the Netherlands, it's quite large, only about a quarter is visible here.
It are the parties from left to right and in the columns are the people in that party whom you can vote for. Yo choose only one. No numbering, no choosing multiple people or parties (that will invalidate your ballot).

I imagine you get need a map to orient yourself on that gigantic ballot? :)


Eh, somewhat similar process here (in Australia). Except we don't have voting cards and we aren't told to vote (provided it's inside the electorate boundaries).
I didn't know you could vote an entire hit-list of candidates. I wonder if that system yields different results than our 2 vote system.

So... What's this thread about?

What are those 2 votes for? I'm not sure what a wahlkreis is, but the one on the right is for the federal parliament?

Re: Voting machines
It's the same here in the Netherlands, and rightly so. The voting process must be as simple and transparant as possible.
We've used voting computers until 8 years ago or something and then the government banned them.
A Wahlkreis would be a district, I guess. With the first vote you determine the person representing that district. The second vote determines how many seats a party gets in the Landtag, which would be the state parliament.

Re:Re: Voting machines
We got rid of voting machines in 2009 ... and we both did it because of the same incident!
„Wij vertrouwen stemcomputers niet“ and the german "Chaos Computer Club (CCC)" demonstrated 2006 on dutch TV how easy those computers could be manipulated and how hard it was to figure out any manipulation took place!
German-Dutch coorporation! It exists!! :)

I do not really understand the purpose of this thread. Although I have guessed the OP wants to share a few good points about German voting and how unfathomable that American messes it up. Weird.

Anyway for the purpose of comparison here is a British polling card:

Cool pictures. The one with the best logo wins! :)
Reminds me on how they solved the voting process problem in some african country with a very low literacy rate. Is that the same reason you got the pictures?

The polling times are a bit narrow don't you think?

I imagine you get need a map to orient yourself on that gigantic ballot? :) Most people just vote for the number one of their desired party, so it isn't that hard, but yeah, it can be a bit overwhelming.

Re:Re: Voting machines
We got rid of voting machines in 2009 ... and we both did it because of the same incident!
„Wij vertrouwen stemcomputers niet“ and the german "Chaos Computer Club (CCC)" demonstrated 2006 on dutch TV how easy those computers could be manipulated and how hard it was to figure out any manipulation took place!
German-Dutch coorporation! It exists!! :) Ah, 6 years ago, thought it was 8. Well close enough ;)

Oh, great. A pirate voter.
Last year I was optimistic about the pirates and compared them to the Green Party during the eigties, but now I can't take them seriously
The Pirate Party today -at least in NRW- is pretty incompetent. They need at least four more years of development until they deserve to be above 5%.
They pretty much said everything from taxes to education and environmental protection is negotiable for them as long they can push their position on intellectual property.
Now it's OK to be a single issue party but you at least need understand the issue. They are even clueless about intellectual property laws and have shown in interviews that they don't know how GEMA works. Not to mention that even if they end up in government they won't be able to make the reforms they want because of the EU and WTO.

People vote for them because the other parties messed and mess up. I myself consider voting for them, too. It's not that I expect them to do anything, it's just a way to express my disenchantment other than going for NPD or MLPD or staying at home.

What I find weirdest about the German pirate party is that they decide on their party views on issues through internet polls (if I understood correctly).
Unless it's mandatory for all members, don't you get a certain 'rule of the vocal minority'?
Ironically through so-called democratic methods you get a very undemocratic party.

People vote for them because the other parties messed and mess up. I myself consider voting for them, too. It's not that I expect them to do anything, it's just a way to express my disenchantment other than going for NPD or MLPD or staying at home.

MLPD ? Why not Die Linke ? They have some funny ideas, but as far as protest votes go they are the least dangerous.
At this point I really believe it's better to stay at home than to vote pirates in order to not contribute to the undeserved hype. it's fince if they get ~5% so they can gain some experience, but everything more than that is too much.

What I find weirdest about the German pirate party is that they decide on their party views on issues through internet polls (if I understood correctly).
Unless it's mandatory for all members, don't you get a certain 'rule of the vocal minority'?

Well, that's how democracy should work. I have nothing against it in principle, it's just that the party os too young and clueless in geenral to deserve as many votes as they get. At least they have spoken out against neo-nazis which tend to flock to every party that concerns itself with civil right.

MLPD ? Why not Die Linke ? They have some funny ideas, but as far as protest votes go they are the least dangerous.
At this point I really believe it's better to stay at home than to vote pirates in order to not contribute to the undeserved hype. it's fince if they get ~5% so they can gain some experience, but everything more than that is too much.
Die Linke doesn't really shock anyone anymore. The other four parties more or less both accepted and for now even contained their advance. They just exist but for now they don't make other parties ask themselves anymore what they did wrong. Besides, I do think that they offer by far the best analysis on why the Euro is failing. It's just their proposed response that I find dead wrong. Since I think that the Euro is the most important issue in politics right now, I can't seriously vote for them.

Funny related topic, every time there is an election in Brazil there is a massive national circle jerk about how awesome our electronic voting machines, how backwards those foreigners are, and how our system is perfect and unhackeable. Of course, every now and then an university research team manages to hack one of them for testing purposes, and the whole notion of an electronic system that can't be hacked is absurd.

This is our voting machine:

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_D4FGzPOHqoE/SSbhDr42iLI/AAAAAAAAAj0/49sTMfLaUhE/s400/Apuka+-+Urna+Eletr%C3%B4nica.bmp

Well, that's how democracy should work.Is it?
To built-in a system to let a party easily be anonymously hijacked? I'm not so sure of the democratic value to be honest.

Also the opportunistic way and lack of coherence between internet polls seems to me to make it an unstable method. It'll be all nimby all the way.
No against austerity and no against government deficit. No against taxes. And yes against free money. And free beer. Things like that.

how backwards those foreigners areBut who are the ones that are backwards? The ones that are using voting machines or the ones that use pen and paper? :p

Is it?
To built-in a system to let a party easily be anonymously hijacked? I'm not so sure of the democratic value to be honest.

Also the opportunistic way and lack of coherence between internet polls seems to me to make it an unstable method. It'll be all nimby all the way.
No against austerity and no against government deficit. No against taxes. And yes against free money. And free beer. Things like that.
Ehm, they have an internet platform for members where they are debating with their full names. I don't see how they are going to get anonymously hijacked.

Ehm, they have an internet platform for members where they are debating with their full names. I don't see how they are going to get anonymously hijacked.The polls will be anonymous, won't they? ;)

Probably, but as long as their registration procedure makes sure that only party members have access to the platform/the right to vote, I see nothing wrong with that. Given their background (IT nerds mostly), I'm fairly confident that they have that under control.

I like electronic voting, and I don't see what's so silly about the idea. Surely the opportunity for fraud is greater with pen & paper than with a re-purposed Cash Machine.

But who are the ones that are backwards? The ones that are using voting machines or the ones that use pen and paper? :p
Everyone who doesn't use our super-sophisticated electronic voting machines.

Believe it or not, they actually tell us those machines are a technological wonder and the envy of the world.

I like electronic voting, and I don't see what's so silly about the idea. Surely the opportunity for fraud is greater with pen & paper than with a re-purposed Cash Machine.

Indeed, electoral fraud actually decreased around here once we adopted electronic vote. But I suppose the main issue some countries have is the lack of accountability to individual citizens.

That said, I don't mind the system at all. We have results much faster now, usually one hour after vote ended we already know the result. But it's not flaw-proof either.

Indeed, electoral fraud actually decreased around here once we adopted electronic vote. But I suppose the main issue some countries have is the lack of accountability to individual citizens.

Indeed. Electronic vote is by design unaccountable to most citizens. They're just forced to take the word of experts that the system is working correctly. Not only is there the potential problem of the experts being incompetent, insufficient, or plain corrupt, there is also the problem of results being always open to attack, should anyone make an issue of it, even if those results happen to be correct, because people don't have the ability to check the process for themselves.

That said, I don't mind the system at all. We have results much faster now, usually one hour after vote ended we already know the result. But it's not flaw-proof either.

Never saw any value in that argument. In a small country of a few million ballots are easily counted manually in a couple of hours, tops. With good coordination it shouldn't take much longer even in a large country.

Actually yes, we did. Extensively. Funny you should ask here instead of reading that there.
Oh you mean that? I didn't peg that as an answer.

(Couldn't the part about Pirate Party be moved into separate thread? It could be an interesting disscusion on its own.)

Indeed, electoral fraud actually decreased around here once we adopted electronic vote. But I suppose the main issue some countries have is the lack of accountability to individual citizens.

That said, I don't mind the system at all. We have results much faster now, usually one hour after vote ended we already know the result. But it's not flaw-proof either.

One hour sounds about right for our pen and paper solution. Electronic voting should give you the results instantly ... but I guess your officials need the hour to 'correct' some minor mistakes, eh? :)

And like mentioned earlier, we had voting computers, too. And they were way more awesome and yours!!!
But they were not perfect enough for us, so we went back to cardboard boxes.

@Aroddo
It makes my heart buzz with nationalistic nostalgia to see a German brother who is dedicated to teach an international audience the superiority of the German ways. Am deutschen Wesen soll die Welt genesen!

I like electronic voting, and I don't see what's so silly about the idea. Surely the opportunity for fraud is greater with pen & paper than with a re-purposed Cash Machine.
You need less expertise / connections / silent support to rick election with pen & paper, so yes, more opportunity. Now just as well, the population has more opportunity to check on those elections. Think of fraud videos in Russia, possible because of pen & paper.
With electronic voting, just as there is less opportunity for fraud, there is less to check on fraud. Which means a natural concentration of power over the voting process at the top.
If lower levels of authority in government and society are so un-trustworthy and your central authorities in turn so trustworthy, then this is a good idea (Brazil as luiz claims). In the UK, where I don't see this to be the case, it is IMO an unnecessary concentration of power and hence an unnecessary risk. The same goes for Germany. And the US maybe already showed this risk to be real.

So @kronic, I personally would trust our authorities to correctly handle electronic voting as well, but the thing at stake - sound elections - is so essential that I don't want any measure taken which gives authorities greater power to screw us without an actual need to do so.

What I find weirdest about the German pirate party is that they decide on their party views on issues through internet polls (if I understood correctly).
Unless it's mandatory for all members, don't you get a certain 'rule of the vocal minority'?
Ironically through so-called democratic methods you get a very undemocratic party.
That is to my knowledge total bullocks and at least the German media does a lot to spread such bullocks. Binding decisions are made in person on party conventions where every party member can come and vote.

I must agree with GoodSarmatian that the current high of the Pirates is not good (I wouldn't say undeserved, though). As he correctly notes, they need a lot of time to get their policies straight. Right now, it appears to be a mess and not suitable for the majorities they poll.
However, I personally plan to vote for them anyway. And not just "out of protest". This is a cliché, the world isn't (I am not anyway :p... I hope..). I vote for their style of politics, not their policies. And I do that because their style is not just a cool image, but hard party policy. Fluid democracy, direct democracy, transparency. Those are precisely not just buzz words, but concepts the Pirates already implement. And quit revolutionary so. They deserve major credit for this and I want to see this flourish. I got no clue in what form exactly (sort of like the Pirates), but that is most of all because it is so new and as said revolutionary. This is what I'll be voting for.

@Aroddo
It makes my heart buzz with nationalistic nostalgia to see a German brother who is dedicated to teach an international audience the superiority of the German ways. Am deutschen Wesen soll die Welt genesen!


You need less expertise / connections / silent support to rick election with pen & paper, so yes, more opportunity. Now just as well, the population has more opportunity to check on those elections. Think of fraud videos in Russia, possible because of pen & paper.
With electronic voting, just as there is less opportunity for fraud, there is less to check on fraud. Which means a natural concentration of power over the voting process at the top.
If lower levels of authority in government and society are so un-trustworthy and your central authorities in turn so trustworthy, then this is a good idea (Brazil as luiz claims). In the UK, where I don't see this to be the case, it is IMO an unnecessary concentration of power and hence an unnecessary risk. The same goes for Germany. And the US maybe already showed this risk to be real.

So @kronic, I personally would trust our authorities to correctly handle electronic voting as well, but the thing at stake - sound elections - is so essential that I don't want any measure taken which gives authorities greater power to screw us without an actual need to do so.

I don't see the difference between trusting the state to ensure that paper votes are secure and trusting the state to ensure that electronic votes are secure. I don't see why you think that power will be concentrated, or why this is a problem... In short, your post makes absolutely no sense to me on any level. Sorry...

In short, your post makes absolutely no sense to me on any level. Sorry...
Oh don't worry, I take this as the result of my incomprehensible genius. ;)

Okay, look: Think of skills. Now here are some skills:
A) Counting ballots, watching someone counting ballots, watching a ballot box being filled by citizens
B) Programming a voting computer, to check on the computing progress

As you will notice, A) refers to pen&paper, while B) to electronic voting. As now becomes obvious, A) is in principle accessible to everyone, while B) is not at all. What follows is a natural accumulation of power with the few which then naturally means a greater power of state authorities because only those few can still challenge them.

Any sense so far?

edit: And if we get less abstract, we don't only have fewer people who hold the skills to check, but even those have with electronic voting a harder time to get access if not explicitly asked to do so by authorities. With pen&paper you can just walk into the place and make a sneak video. Hence my example with the Russian clips.

I don't see the difference between trusting the state to ensure that paper votes are secure and trusting the state to ensure that electronic votes are secure.
You can't see the difference between the skills and knowledge required to check that someone isn't messing with a bunch of papers, and checking the inner working of electronics and software ?
Are you serious ?

EDIT: Nevermind, I don't really care enough to argue about it. Maybe one day you people will join us in the 20th century.

Finally, it's really freaking easy to rig a pen & paper ballot; it's much more difficult to rig a computer system. If I trust a government commission with something that they can easily rig, why shouldn't I trust them with something that's really hard to rig?

That's the thing: It's absolutely NOT easy to rig a pen&paper ballot! At least not in a way that's not too obvious.
It all depends on your civil rights and voting process, of course. In our case, the officials are fully accountable and the voting and the counting of the ballots have to be public and transparent.
So imagine you want to swing the vote your way and you know that you will lose badly without fudging the results. How would you do that?

Report the wrong number of votes.
Works until citizens insist on a recount, which will show a stark discrepancy.
Fake all ballots beforehand.
Great idea. Prepare 100.000 handwritten ballots for a single medium sized town. Millions for a whole state. That many manhours are quite an investment ... and every single helper has the power to blackmail you. Not to speak of having to pay the helpers.
Fake some ballots beforehand.
Reduces manhour and thus blackmail opportunities and money. However, the ballots are still being counted and it is recorded how many people came to vote. So you have to remove as close as possible the exact number of ballots before inserting your fake ones. Otherwise there is a significant discrepancy between actual voters and ballots counted, which can lead to a public recount. And a couple of thousand ballots with the same vote and the X in the same style will be noticed.
Let your own people do the counting
Ballots are not counted alone, so you have to replace all the election helpers in a significant number of polling stations. If successful however, they are in a good position to deliver believable fake numbers that actually add up without arousing suspicion. Still, routine sample recounts can pick up the manipulation since the ballots differ from the reported numbers.
Fake the ballots, let your own people do the counting and report the numbers you like.
If you manage to do that then you don't really need to bother with elections anyway.


Now electronic voting.

Manipulate the voting computer to count the correct number of votes and generate a result in your favor.
Done. Without a paper trail to proof otherwise, there is no way to prove that the result is wrong.


I'll stick to paper ballots, no matter how archaic that might seem.

EDIT: Nevermind, I don't really care enough to argue about it. Maybe one day you people will join us in the 20th century.
Again? I thought 100 years quit enough.
And I must say, I am disappointed. The argument wasn't that complex. :(

EDIT: Nevermind, I don't really care enough to argue about it. Maybe one day you people will join us in the 20th century.
Sorry, we're in the 21th century now, and waiting for you to catch up.

So @kronic, I personally would trust our authorities to correctly handle electronic voting as well, but the thing at stake - sound elections - is so essential that I don't want any measure taken which gives authorities greater power to screw us without an actual need to do so.
I wasn't advocating to introduce electronic voting in national elections. I only commented on the decision making process within a party. My point was mainly to refute anandus' claim that the Pirates were somehow less democratic than other parties. Not to mention that I find it deeply ironic that our main parties, where decision-making most of the time happens top down, i.e. leaders setting the agenda and framing the entire debate by pushing their position, are considered democratic.

Of course, I am not quit sure how I read it otherwise. Too much in a hurry. :blush:
And yes, "democratic" is a term raped good. Though not necessarily only for illegitimate reasons (while that, too, of course). It's the freak child of a bi-polar-dynamic. The image this word represent and it's actual down-to-earth use.
To pick up your example: The image that parties are the result of collective will. The use that collective will is only there to constrain individual will (party elite). Die Piraten tries to bring image and use closer together. Conservatives will claim that this is naive, that use and image are supposed to be as different as they are. I am not so sure and it seems you are neither.

Sorry, we're in the 21th century now, and waiting for you to catch up.
You really are bad at irony aren't you.

You really are bad at irony aren't you.
Not half as bad as you are at understanding a point.
When you don't even get the argument that a paper system is good because it's a very simple system that allows anyone to check if things are done properly, I'm afraid that trying to be subtle will be somehow lost.

No idea if a mod bothers to show up, but this flaming got a little too far IMO, so I reported.

Why not use electronic voting machines that also print a paper ballot, or at least a printout of its own results after voting ends? Then there's electronic counting for less labor, but also paper trail should a recount be necessary.

I didn't know you could vote an entire hit-list of candidates. I wonder if that system yields different results than our 2 vote system.

The big one is the Senate ballot, where we elect 6 members per state each election. And yes, those preference flows are important for the last couple of seats in each state.

In practice, most people number one box "above the line" which leads to a default allocation of preferences. Voting below the line lets you choose your own preference order instead.