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Distrust Breeds Bureaucracy: Democratization And The Formal Regulation Of Electoral Governance In Mexico, Andreas Schedler

Andreas Schedler

In contemporary Mexico, political parties have subject electoral authorities to tight legal regulation. Their reliance on “bureaucratic” control sheds light on a crucial premise of “post-bureaucratic” approaches: deregulation presupposes trust. The article describes the distrust-driven regulation of three areas of electoral governance: record keeping, the identification of voters and ballots, and time rules. It concludes with reflections on the potential costs of bureaucratizing electoral governance.