Bulletin n. 2-3/2012
October 2012-February 2013
CONTENTS
  • Section A) The theory and practise of the federal states and multi-level systems of government
  • Section B) Global governance and international organizations
  • Section C) Regional integration processes
  • Section D) Federalism as a political idea
    • Crook Malcolm, Crook Tom
    L’isoloir universel ? La globalisation du scrutin secret au XIXe siècle
    in Revue d'histoire du XIXe siècle , numéro 43, 2011 ,  2011 ,  41-45
    L’isoloir universel ? The globalization of the secret ballot in the 19th century These days we take it for granted that the secret ballot is the only method of voting compatible with free and fair elections. However, this has not always been the case and the study that follows contributes to a critical history of the vote that historians are beginning to construct. During the long nineteenth century, as countries considered adopting the secret ballot, there was much argument over its relationship to democracy. This debate was conducted on a global scale, as different western countries compared and contrasted various aspects of their respective electoral systems. This transnational approach to reform, based on improved communications and international mobility, has not been recognised. Yet without it the pioneering ‘Australian Ballot’, with its printed ballot papers and polling booths, would not have been invented, nor disseminated across the world. This colonial innovation directly inspired reform in Britain, then the United States, and it was later relayed to France after its adoption in Belgium. Even so, while the diffusion of the secret ballot offers a striking illustration of transnationalism, it was far from imposing uniformity as local variations in practice persisted.
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