Suchergebnisse

Encyclopaedias and handbooks, etc, all present Tasmania's starting date for implementing the secret ballot as 1858. But this research note argues the correct date was two years earlier in 1856. Moreover, before this, Tasmania's early 1830s participation in the Australia–wide proballot campaign, and its Constitutional inclinations towards the ballot have also been overlooked. To correct this omission relevant background is presented which highlights the riotous behaviour of pre–ballot elections. This is followed by a summary concerning the ballot's starting dates for Victoria and South Australia. Having confirmed these basic facts, further evidence is presented regarding Tasmania's true application of the secret ballot, including citations from a rare copy of the state's 1856 Electoral Act. In short, this "rediscovery" means that Tasmania definitely deserves a new place in the history of Australia's famous democratic innovation.

In this paper, we argue that because of the advent of Artificial Intelligence, the secret ballot is now much less effective at protecting voters from voting related instances of social ostracism and social punishment. If one has access to vast amounts of data about specific electors, then it is possible, at least with respect to a significant subset of electors, to infer with high levels of accuracy how they voted in a past election. Since the accuracy levels of Artificial Intelligence are so high, the practical consequences of someone inferring one's vote are identical to the practical consequences of having one's vote revealed directly under an open voting regime. Therefore, if one thinks that the secret ballot is at least partly justified because it protects electors against voting related social ostracism and social punishment, one should be morally troubled by how Artificial Intelligence today can be used to infer individual electors' past voting behaviour.

Can the media determine the success or failure of institutional reforms? We study the adoption of secret voting in the US and the role of media in this arguably crucial step to improve democracy. Using a difference-in-difference identification strategy and a rich dataset on local newspapers, we find that in areas with high levels of media penetration democratization outcomes improved following the adoption of the secret ballot. Specifically, the press contributed to the decrease in partisan attachment and support for dominant parties. The press also undermined the manipulation of electoral boundaries and the unintentional decline in turnout incentivized with the introduction of the secret ballot. We consider multiple concerns about our identification strategy and address the potential endogeneity of newspapers using an instrumental variable approach that exploits the introduction of wood-pulp paper technology in 1880 combined with counties¿ woodland coverage during the same period. Exploring the heterogeneous effects of our results, we argue that the media mattered through the distribution of information to voters and the increase of public awareness about political misconduct.