The Quick Count and Election Observation

CHAPTER SIX: THE QUALITATIVE COMPONENT OF THE QUICK COUNT
82 important questions is to collect reliable and systematic information from welltrained
observers.
The qualitative data
provide a systematic
way of evaluating
election day processes
on a national basis.
Because national elections
are difficult to
organize you can
expect that some
things might go wrong
on election day.
This chapter is divided into two parts and provides basic guidelines for designing
the qualitative component of the election-day observation. To collect
qualitative data, observers use standardized forms, and the place to begin is
with the design of these forms. What should observers try to measure? What
questions should be included? And what principles should be followed to make
sure that the questions included on forms will produce reliable and useful evidence?
What are the most common mistakes, and how can these be avoided?
These issues are illustrated with a discussion of observer forms that have been
used in the field. The second part of the chapter discusses a variety of strategies
that can be used to analyze the qualitative results.
Two preliminary points need to be emphasized regarding the qualitative component
of an election obseservation. The first is that the general methodology
driving the qualitative evaluation of elections through observer reports is exactly
the same as the methodology that underpins the generation of the vote
count data for the quick count. The qualitative reports come from the same
observers and from the same polling stations used for the retrieval of vote
count data. Recall that these polling stations are sample points that are determined
by random selection. This means that the qualitative data gathered
from observers have the same statistical properties as the vote count data; the
findings of the qualitative analysis of sample data can be reliably generalized
to the quality of the entire election-day process throughout the country. The
same margins of error also apply. Because of these characteristics, the qualitative
data provide a systematic way of evaluating election day processes on a
national basis. 1
The second primary point to emphasize is: there is no such thing as an election
that is completely free of error. Nor does the fact that errors have been
made necessarily mean that fraud has taken place. Nationwide elections are
complicated events to plan and administer. Election-day mistakes are made
everywhere. In the vast majority of cases, these mistakes are simply a matter
of human error. A polling official may get sick and fail to report to the polling
station on election morning. As a result, a polling station may end up being
short of the proper number of officials. Materials might have been misplaced
or inadvertently sent to the wrong polling station. A polling station might not
open on time because someone forgot to tell a supervisor that a building has
to be unlocked early on Sunday morning so that officials can set up. Because
national elections are difficult to organize you can expect that some things
might go wrong on election day.
1
Quick counts discussed in this handbook most often concern national elections (e.g., presidential elections
and elections for proportional representation by national political party lists). The data collected
for such quick counts is highly reliable for evaluating national developments but will not necessarily
be able to assess processes and results at the sub-national level, such as elections for single-member
legislative districts or local elections – unless the quick count is specifically designed to do so.