Elections shape who holds power and how societies govern themselves. This archive tracks progress in voting access, electoral integrity, civic participation, and democratic reforms — from local breakthroughs to national milestones — showing where democracy is strengthening around the world.
In the Democratic-controlled court’s decision, the majority said the boundaries “clearly, plainly and palpably” violate the state’s constitution and blocked the boundaries from remaining in effect for the 2018 elections with just weeks until dozens of people file paperwork to run for Congress.
The ruling was the first time that a federal court had blocked a congressional map because of a partisan gerrymander, and it instantly endangered Republican seats in the coming elections.
Today, Governor Jerry Brown signed into law the landmark California DISCLOSE Act (AB 249), the nation’s most comprehensive election disclosure law.
Since registered voters skew older, Oregon’s automatic voter registration law is correcting the age bias and giving people of all ages access to the ballot.
The people of Nepal have voted for representatives in municipal and village councils for the first time in two decades, a landmark moment in the country’s transition to democracy.
The city’s new “Democracy Voucher” program, the first of its kind in the US, provides every eligible Seattle resident with $100 in taxpayer-funded vouchers to donate to the candidates of their choice.
With the unanimous passage in both the Illinois House and Senate of automatic voter registration (AVR) legislation, it is safe to say this particular reform is moving along rapidly with bipartisan support.
Ranked-choice voting went statewide for the first time in the U.S. when Maine voters approved it on Election Day 2016, passing the ballot initiative with about 52 percent support. The shift came after two governor’s races won with pluralities, including one victory at just 37 percent. A small state quietly rethinking what majority rule means.
Ireland legalized same-sex marriage by popular vote on May 22, 2015, becoming the first country to enshrine it through a national referendum. More than 1.2 million voters said yes, with only one of the country’s constituencies returning a No majority. In a nation where divorce had been illegal two decades earlier, citizens rewrote their own constitution.
Iran’s Green Movement brought millions into the streets in the summer of 2009, after a disputed presidential election handed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a landslide victory that opposition supporters rejected as fraudulent. On June 15, a crowd estimated in the hundreds of thousands to three million gathered around Tehran’s Azadi Tower — the largest demonstration in the Islamic Republic’s history to that point.
