Fabio Bargiacchi, the Executive Director of ECES, Eva Palmans, ECES Head of Programme, and the former Senior Electoral Researcher at ECES, Mathieu Merino, have contributed to the recently published Handbook of the Council of Europe: Using International Standards in elections: Council of Europe Handbook for Domestic Election Observers. The Handbook is available on the web site of the Council of Europe and already translated in Georgian, Romanian, Russian and Ukrainian. The Handbook was produced with the support of the European Commission and Norway. Francois FRIEDERICH, the Head of Division Directorate General II – Democracy Directorate of Democratic Governance Electoral Assistance and Census Division of the Council of Europe wrote the following in his foreword: This handbook serves as a guide for domestic observers on how to use international standards (hereby referring to international obligations, commitments and best practices) in their daily work. The handbook gives an overview of in which phase of the election cycle international standards could be used and in which way. The Council of Europe compiled this handbook within the framework of the Eastern Partnership Facility, a programme funded by the European Union (EU) and implemented by the Council of Europe in cooperation with Armenia, Azerbaijan,Belarus, Georgia, the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine. The handbook is divided into four parts: Introduction, International Standards, The Election Cycle and Annex. The part “International standards” is composed of two chapters: “What international standards are we talking about?” and “What are themain principals of international standards?” The part about the Election Cycle is composed of two chapters: “Why focus on the entire election cycle?”, and “How can international standards be integrated into the election cycle?” The second chapter, “How can international standards be integrated into the election cycle” examines how to integrate international standards into the legal framework, strategic planning, the training of observers, internal and external reporting, as well as post‐election assistance. In the Annexes the following information can be found: reporting guidelines, selected literature, abbreviations, as well as data about the authors. This publication serves not only as a reference for domestic election observers, but also for governmental officials, political parties, election officials, voters and civil society organisations who plan to implement election activities and who are inclined to integrate international standards into their election activities. The handbook could also be useful as a training tool for future domestic election observers. Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the experts who kindly contributed to this handbook, in particular Marie‐Carin von Gumppenberg, Tim Baker, Fabio Bargiacchi, Milica Kovačević, Mathieu Merino, Andria Nadiradze, Eva Palmans, Vladimir Pran, and Igor D. Gaon. Our gratitude goes also to the European Commission and the Kingdom of Norway that supported this project.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 08:13:27 +0000
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