In emerging democratic settings, scholars and policy experts regard electoral management bodies (EMBs) as one of the most important institutions in guaranteeing that political actors adhere to the rules of the electoral contest and that the substantive outcome of elections is not predetermined. Unfortunately, systematic and thorough assessment of EMBs has largely escaped the spotlight of democracy scholars.My dissertation probes two critical questions concerning the important, yet understudied role of electoral management bodies in emerging democracies. First, what factors influence the design of electoral administration in Africa? Second, what are the consequences of electoral administrative design and performance on the quality of elections in Africa?To answer the first question, I propose a theoretical framework, grounded in historical institutionalism, which attributes election administrative reform to the strategic interactions of domestic and international actors along with the path dependency of institutional legacies during different stages of democracy. Through a comparative analysis of election administrative reforms in a cross-section of African countries, I emphasize the complexity of the reform process and highlight various models of institutional reform. I argue, however, that incumbents are more likely to enact reforms that enhance the autonomy and capacity of electoral administration when they face credible and enduring pressure from a coalition of opposition parties, civil society groups and international actors.In subsequent chapters, I turn my attention to the consequences of electoral administrative design and performance. Primarily, I consider how EMB design and performance may shape the incentives and behaviors of political elite and regular citizens. Using cross-national data on election administrative design and performance in Africa from 1990 to 2008 and data on elites' and citizens' perspectives of election quality, I find EMB performance has the greatest impact on electoral attitudes and behavior. That is, EMBs that display higher levels of actual autonomy and capacity are more likely to enhance electoral integrity by reducing opportunities for electoral fraud, lowering the incidence of procedural irregularities and enhancing citizens' quality of participation in electoral processes. In the penultimate chapter of the dissertation, I rely on survey data from the 2007 and 2011 Nigerian elections to consider whether citizens' personal evaluations of electoral administrative autonomy and capacity are positively associated with their perceptions of election quality. The findings confirm my expectations, even after accounting for Nigerians' experience with electoral irregularities and their political preferences.I use a variety of methods in my dissertation. These include large-n statistical analysis of survey data and other data, as well as small-n comparative analysis of election management in Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa and Zimbabwe using process tracing and content analysis. This multi-method approach also includes collecting original cross-national data on election administrative design in Africa, conducting elite interviews in Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa and Zimbabwe, and observing elections in Ghana (2008) and Nigeria (2011).
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