Association of World Election Bodies

The Association of World Election Bodies, commonly referred to as ‘A-WEB’, was established on October 14, 2013 in Song-do, South Korea. A-WEB is the first global organization of election management bodies, and the membership currently consists of 118 EMBs as members and 20 Regional associations as associate members. Under the slogan of ‘Democracy to Grow for All Worldwide,’ the A-WEB Secretariat provides training programs for election officials of member nations and undertakes country programs at the request of member organization, providing support during the election cycle to boost election management capacity.^[1] The current chairman is Mosotho Moepya from South Africa.^[2]

Creation and inauguration

The National Election Commission of the Republic of Korea first proposed the creation of a global election management body institution to the Association of Asian Election Authorities (AAEA) in 2010. After a series of Working Group meetings,^[3] a Charter was drawn up and the name A-WEB was chosen upon the suggestion of the Election Commission of India.^[4]

A-WEB was inaugurated on October 14, 2013. Over 400 participants from 140 election management bodies, international organizations and non-governmental organizations attended the ceremony in Song-do, South Korea, where the Secretariat was established. 97 organizations gained membership into A-WEB.^[5]

Structure

A-WEB has three main bodies. The Executive Board serves the executive function and meets yearly to make decisions on A-WEB's general direction. It consists of up to ten member organizations and the Board must maintain a continental balance. The more members there are from a particular continent, the more members of the Executive Board should be from that continent. The Executive Board is headed by a Chairperson who leads the meetings of the board.

The remaining members make up the second body, the General Assembly. The General Assembly convenes once every two years and votes on important issues related to A-WEB and decisions made by the Executive Board. The General Assembly also elects the members of the Executive Board and confirms the induction of new member organizations.

Finally, the secretariat carries out the general administrative work of A-WEB and is based in the country where the Secretary General (elected by the Executive Board) resides. Currently the secretariat is based in Song-do, South Korea. Other member countries send secondee staff to operate the office.^[6]

A-WEB Programs

Election Management Capacity Building Program

A-WEB organizes the Election Management Capacity Building Program for election officials to strengthen the election management capacity and manage their elections more effectively and professionally in the future. More specifically, the Election Management Capacity Building Program aims:

to support the participants to study various electoral systems, discuss issues and challenges each EMB is facing and come up with solutions to the shared problems;
to provide an opportunity to exchange good practices and learn an international standard of election management;
to establish a network of election officials around the world and encourage them to share their experiences and expertise.

Diverse professional electoral stakeholders are invited as a guest lecturers to help participants have a better understanding of all aspects of election management and electoral cycle. The program also enables the participants to learn not only from the lecturer(s), but also from amongst the participants themselves through interactive discussions.

Each program addresses a particular topic on the electoral process such as political participation of marginalized groups, gender equality, and media in election management, giving the participants a chance to consider overlooked elements that may affect the fairness of their election management.

Country Programs

Country Programs aim to strengthen the accuracy in election processes by improving systems related to election management and support the establishment of ‘good governance’ based on the needs and demands of EMBs.

Election Visitor Program

A-WEB Election Visitor Program aims to increase understanding of different election systems and to share and spread better practices and the use of ICT in elections through observing election administration of member EMBs, as the article 4.1. of A-WEB charter; Encourage the development and promotion of a democratic culture and an environment conducive to the holding of free, fair, transparent and participative elections.