In an attempt to reverse declining rates of voter participation, governments around the world are turning to electronic voting to improve the efficiency of vote counts, and increase the accessibility and equity of the voting process for electors who may face additional barriers. The Covid-19 pandemic has intensified this trend.

Voting Online focuses on Canada, where the technology has been widely embraced by municipal governments with one of the highest rates of use in the world. In the age of cyber elections, Canada is the only country where governments offer fully remote electronic elections and where traditional paper voting is eliminated for entire electorates. Municipalities are the laboratories of electoral modernization when it comes to digital voting reform. We know conspicuously little about the effects of these changes, particularly the elimination of paper ballots.

Relying on surveys of voters, non-voters, and candidates in twenty Ontario cities, and a survey of administrators across the province of Ontario, Voting Online provides a holistic view of electronic elections unavailable anywhere else.

Voting Online investigates the effects of cyber elections by looking at how adoption of online voting affects attitudes towards democracy, who uses and who benefits from the voting mode, the extent to which candidates support it, and what factors election administrators consider when deciding to adopt it. The authors provide important lessons for all interested in the health of democratic societies.

“Voting Online will become an important reference point for practitioners and academics alike. Particularly novel are its findings on the effect of online voting on satisfaction levels with (local) democracy, which are likely to spark debate.” Micha Germann, senior lecturer in Comparative Politics, University of Bath

“I very much enjoyed reading Voting Online. The authors do an excellent job of profiling the importance of their subject, showing how their research findings inform comparative politics.” Jean-François Daoust, Université de Sherbrooke, and co-author of The Motivation to Vote

How do governments, administrators, candidates, and electors view the increasing trend toward online voting in Ontario’s municipalities?

Nicole Goodman is associate professor in the Department of Political Science at Brock University.

Helen A. Hayes is a PhD candidate in the Department of Art History and Communication Studies at McGill University.

R. Michael McGregor is associate professor in the Department of Politics and Public Administration at Toronto Metropolitan University.

Scott Pruysers is associate professor in the Department of Political Science at Dalhousie University.

Zachary Spicer is associate professor in the School of Public Policy and Administration at York University.