Toward digital democracy

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Improving registration
Reforming the entire voting process is all but impossible because it has so many different parts. Reforming part by part, however, can lead to substantive improvement that promises to make a significant difference for the average voter.

Because voting begins with registration, it makes sense that reform should begin with that process. Voter registration rolls are hard to maintain and update, requiring constant attention. People die, relocate and change their names--life events that require updates to registration rolls. Voters cannot be counted on to alert election officials to such changes. Furthermore, election agencies vary in the way they handle their rolls. Some still store registration forms in boxes and manually update registration. Others agencies digitize all completed applications and never refer to the paper originals. Only rigorous performance analysis can find an optimum system for a particular locality.

The creation of state-level registration databases has emerged at the top of reformers' must-do lists. Officials charged with registration management would be smart to follow the examples of database-driven companies, such as credit card marketers, and better track the voting population.

Public and private databases are powerful tools. But they require tight security and management, since they aggregate names, addresses, Social Security numbers and dates of birth--all the elements needed for identity theft or fraudulent voting. Even well-guarded, centralized electoral rolls worry privacy advocates. Some states retain the right to sell the voter information they collect; others provide it, with limited safeguards, over the Internet.

A major problem with using the Internet for elections is assuring the voting public that results are true and accurate. Emerging technology, however, promises enhanced security that reduces the chance of flawed registration and tabulations.

The Defense Department?s Medium Assurance Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) technology has emerged as a principal means for achieving secure Internet transactions with any party, known or unknown. Although PKI technology ensures a secure link across the Internet, it does not guarantee that the user is who he or she claims to be, since an unauthorized user could steal a person's private key and obtain the PIN code.

Combining three types of identification and authentication mechanisms helps mitigate this security problem:

• Tokens (something you have): a diskette or smart card that stores a private key.

• Passwords (something you know): a verbal or alphanumeric identifier.

• Biometrics (something you are): measurable physical characteristics, such as a fingerprint, an iris, or facial features.

Biometric products in the workplace already are proving the technology?s viability. Examples include Walt Disney World's use of hand geometry systems to authenticate season-pass holders; the Home Shopping Network's use of voice authentication with its telephone-ordering system; and the New York Department of Social Services' use of fingerprint authentication systems to verify the identity of entitlement program participants.

Stepping up to digital democracy
The decentralized, antiquated U.S. election process means that reformers should look for short-term, low-risk opportunities for change.

Within most states, there has been little coordination in voting equipment from one county to the next. Each one bought whatever system it wanted, with little consideration of the eventual desirability of linking election machinery across a state.

For the 2000 election in Florida, 41 counties used optical scan machines (which read ovals filled in by voters), 24 counties used punch cards, one used lever machines, and one used paper ballots. The reform act signed by Gov. Jeb Bush in May imposed some order on this agglomeration by prohibiting punch-card systems.

At the same time, small-scale use of the Internet has met with some success in elections. In Alaska last year, the Republican Party was faced with the problem of overcoming such common voter deterrents as vast distances between homes and polling places, lack of transportation, and unreliable postal service. The state GOP used the Internet to conduct a presidential straw poll. Republicans were able to vote using a system developed by VoteHere.net. Although the nature of the nonbinding straw vote was too informal to judge its efficacy fully, a number of voters were able to overcome previously insurmountable logistics problems and cast a ballot.

In Arizona, the Democratic Party worked with Election.com in an Internet voting program that increased turnout in its statewide primary by an astonishing 676 percent from the 1996 primary. The party sent all 843,000 registered Democrats a PIN that let them access the party's site or Election.com. Participants were prompted to answer several personal questions; answers were compared to information on registration cards. After authentication, a ballot appeared on the screen. Voters selected their candidates and submitted their votes. Of the 86,000 Democrats voting, 36,000 cast votes online, 32,000 via mail, and an additional 18,000 voted in person.

Although the systems in those experiments allowed citizens to vote with relative convenience, full certification of a voting system requires much deeper engagement. Any equipment used in traditional elections must undergo a rigorous certification process by an independent testing organization. The purpose of this procedure is to provide third-party verification that the equipment meets the stringent requirements established by federal and state standards. There is no evidence that either of these systems would have passed such intense scrutiny and evaluation.

The ultimate change management project
Our analysis suggests that there are at least as many poor ideas as good ideas in the voting reform marketplace. Recent missteps are proof that, even with the best of intentions, some states and localities have made--and will continue to make--reform decisions that could haunt their electorates.

Just as is true in business, being first to market with a new product does not always ensure success. Some localities are purchasing election-related technology without getting answers to some fundamental questions: What will election authorities do if, after limited state and local dollars have been spent, there are as many lost votes as in previous elections? What sorts of lawsuits will stem from poor reform decisions? Will part-time, volunteer election authorities be able to manage new technology placed in polling stations?

The lessons won't come easily. Reformers in the U.S. are working at an operational disadvantage. The simple truth is that the world's most influential democracy likely will be a follower, not a leader, in digital democracy.

The politicians and academics who have embraced electoral reform as their cause celebre have platforms, passion and the public's attention. Yet, because they most often have not worked in business, they lack a manager's experience with large-scale performance improvement.

Before any real change becomes effective, the managers of the electoral system will have to learn more about business--the principles that should be the foundation of the electoral process.

By applying these practices, they can build an election system that is faithful to our founding principles and the envy of the rest of the world.

To read more articles like this one, visit www.strategy-business.com.

Reprinted with permission from strategy+business, a quarterly management magazine published by Booz Allen Hamilton.