Improving crisis management in the imperfect world of foreign electoral assistance
✍ Scribed by David Hirschmann
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 1998
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 176 KB
- Volume
- 18
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0271-2075
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
This article's primary focus is on improving techniques of crisis management of electoral assistance. In so doing it intends to contribute to a more systematic sharing of information about lessons learned and possible responses to the pressure of providing electoral support when time is short. It is therefore concerned with situations in which there are not only the usual large gaps between ideal and reality, a host of imperfections and uncertainties, a multiplicity of chains of command and con¯icting agendas, a shortage of resources, and endless possibilities for genuine and crafted misunderstandings, but also a lack of time for analysis and preparation. The article looks at such rushed' electoral assistance from the perspective of the manager'; this is a term that will serve as shorthand for a hypothetical electoral assistance manager in an international governmental or non-governmental donor agency who is given responsibility for managing the assistance but is usually not part of the political or policymaking of®ce of his or her embassy or agency.