Digital technology, citizens’ engagement and electoral corruption in Colombia

This chapter examines innovations by Colombia’s civil society to counter electoral corruption. Like many countries, electoral corruption is a long-standing problem in Colombia. Illegal campaign financing, vote buying, voter intimidation, voter impersonation, and ballot-box stuffing are frequent practices in many parts of the country. I examine the effect of digital technologies on the activities performed by the Mission of Electoral Observation (Misión de Observación Electoral, MOE as a Spanish acronym), an organisation created by Colombian activists in 2006. MOE’s ability to gather and process data on electoral corruption from multiple sources, including citizens’ reports of corruption using crowdsourcing technology, and thousands of observers in polling stations, has allowed it to push forward the agenda on electoral integrity in Colombia. Like other organisations working on anti-corruption, the MOE faces challenges to engage citizens in online and offline activities, and its proposals of reform of electoral administration face substantial backlash by political elites.