What is Electoral Database

Technology pervades every aspect of modern life. It has an impact on the democratic life of a nation (Chen, Gibson, & Geiselhart, 2006) and is frequently an object of dispute and negotiation, affecting the way politics is done, by shaping new forms of planning and performing political actions. The changing of professional politics is fuelled up by the increasing use of information and communication technologies by both citizens and organizations. Attempts to increase the use of technology to run elections (Hawthorn & Simons, 2006) are just one aspect of this movement. Many researchers also identify a steady pace of change on the nature of political parties and the ways politics is performed by politicians: Margetts (2001) notices the emergence of cyber parties, characterized by technologically-aided relationships between party and voters rather then formal membership. Pedersen and Saglie (2005) present a survey discussing how this and other kinds of party organizations (e.g. media and networked parties) affect traditional Scandinavian parties. Information systems are themselves instruments of power in several ways. As an example, Hayes and Walsham (1999) discuss the political use of information stored in shared databases. Their study shows how databases storing contact and activity information were used by employees and managers to foster they careers, impose their views and control people subordinated to them. Applications used in or related to politics are information intensive, making databases a prime element in building politically oriented applications. This article discusses some aspects of database related technology necessary for this kind of application.