The prevailing sentiment among most Britons towards Labour’s proposed initiative to extend voting rights to 16-year-olds is scepticism. However, the precedents set by nations such as Scotland, Brazil, and Austria, where the voting age has been lowered to 16, challenge these apprehensions. Contrary to popular belief, implementing such a policy could cultivate a more politically active and engaged citizenry in their later years. During his election campaign, Labour leader Keir Starmer endorsed reducing the legal voting age from 18 to 16, indicating a potential inclusion of this policy in the party’s manifesto. The Labour party has deliberated the matter for more than a year, considering its implementation in Scotland and Wales for local and devolved parliamentary elections. In his statement, …

Kurdistan’s overdue parliamentary elections are set to take place on 6 June 2024. Judging by previous election cycles, however, their occurrence relies on a precarious political balancing act, with unpromising prospects. Kurds across Kurdistan have managed to safeguard stability, security, and thriving economies, standing in stark contrast to the mayhem and violence that characterises the wider region. Yet, creating a democratic island amid the turmoil of the Middle East has been profoundly challenging. Democratic elections are one of the key routes to achieving this objective. Introduction More than a centenary has passed since Kurdistan, the homeland of the Kurds, was partitioned. The prospect of an independent Kurdistan followed the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in the aftermath of World War …

According to a recent national survey on crime and victimisation in Brazil, more than fifty per cent of respondents reported having been robbed at least once, while 85 per cent know at least one other person who has been victim of the same crime. Latinobarómetro data from 2023 shows that 59 per cent of Brazilian respondents are worried “all the time” about becoming a crime victim. Such alarming numbers are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to crime and violence in the largest country in the Southern hemisphere. Results from the most recent National Transport Confederation (Conferederação Brasileira do Transporte, CNT) national poll conducted in mid-January 2024 clearly indicate public safety as the major challenge to be …

Welcome to the OxPol Blogcast, a podcast where we will be sharing research, analysis, and experiences from members of the University of Oxford’s Department of Politics and International Relations. On each, episode we will talk to a guest about a piece they’ve written for the OxPol Blog. Then, we’ll discuss their larger research agenda, their insights on conducting political science, and their time at Oxford. On this episode of the OxPol BlogCast, host Chase Harrison talks to DPhil student Javier Pérez Sandoval about Mexico’s upcoming midterm election, theories of voter choices, and analysing democracy at the subnational level. Read the original blog post here: https://blog.politics.ox.ac.uk/a-return-to-the-right-for-mexico-foucaults-pendulum-and-missed-political-opportunities/ Views expressed on this podcasts are those of the guests alone and are not representative of …

In June 2021, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, Mexico will face what is bound to be one of the most complex mid-term elections the country has seen in the last two decades. At stake is control of 15 (out of 32) governorships, 30 state legislatures, 1,900 municipalities and a complete renewal of the Lower Chamber of Congress. The outcome will clearly be either a punishment or a reward for the leftist administration of Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) and the ballots cast this summer will undoubtedly make or break the second half of his presidency. The extent to which the COVID-shock has impacted individual political preferences in Mexico remains unclear. Looking at the most recent available data to conduct an exploratory …

Zbigniew Brzezinski noted that the politics of fear is an efficient means of control because it “obscures reason and intensifies emotions.” After more than 34 years in power, President Museveni of Uganda—who toppled Milton Obote’s regime in 1986 after years in the bush with the National Resistance Movement (NRM)—understood the politics of fear better than anyone else. If one still had doubts, the death of around 40 people in Kampala at a political rally organized by Bobi Wine, Museveni’s main opponent, in November came to confirm one thing: it is election season in Uganda. On 14 January 2021, Ugandans will go to the polls. Museveni will most likely win re-election, after having scrapped the presidential term and age limits in 2005 and 2017 respectively. However, this piece argues that the intense politics of fear used by his regime can be interpreted as the possible end of post-liberation politics in Uganda.   Post-liberation …

Ghana goes to the polls on December 7th. However, for the first time in 24 years, the major stakeholders—including the Electoral Commission (EC) and the leading opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) party—could not arrive at a consensus over the electoral rules that will govern the election in 2020. Agreed upon electoral rules have historically been critical towards securing a stable electoral process. Amidst the prevailing dispute on the electoral rules, we argue that a tense political climate is building which, if not well managed, could lead up to violent contestation of the results of the December 2020 elections and, in the process, undermine Ghana’s time-honoured integrity as a beacon of democracy in Africa.  Background on the dispute The dispute over the rules for this year’s election …

The South Korean legislative election on 15 April 2020 received high attention in international news as the first national election held under the constraints of the COVID-19 pandemic. Still, voter turnout, at 66.2 per cent, was the highest in 28 years and a North Korean defector, for the first time, was elected to the unicameral National Assembly (Gukhoe). The election, which resulted in a landslide victory for the incumbent government’s party, was the first under a new electoral reform that introduced compensation seats within the proportional representation (PR) tier of the mixed electoral system. In response, both major parties set up satellite organisations that only competed for PR seats. Thereby, the major parties consolidated their hegemony in the National Assembly …