The COVID-19 pandemic is not only a health and economic emergency; it is also a crisis for democracy, human rights, and governance that could undermine or collapse fragile democracies. The pandemic poses severe threats to democratic governance, elections, and transitions.
Countries across the world are taking various precautions, including staying home and avoiding situations involving enormous crowds to reduce the chances of coming into contact with someone who may have COVID-19 to contain the disease. Precautions such as these are necessary to avoid community spread. Quarantines, the shuttering of community spaces, and other actions to contain the spread of this potentially deadly illness introduce complications in administering elections, threatening voters’ ability to vote.
These have economic, constitutional, and technical implications for the timing and administration of elections. A peep into the corridor of global democracy via electoral management bodies and news media shows that many elections have been postponed because of the outbreak of COVID-19 and some countries continue to conduct elections amid the COVID-19 crisis.
Download the full infographic to know countries that have postponed and conducted elections amid COVID-19 pandemics. Infographic: Elections amid COVID-19
