CAUSES OF ELECTORAL VIOLENCE IN POST-CONFLICT COUNTRIES: INSTITUTIONS, POLITICAL COMPETITION, AND THE CHALLENGES OF DEMOCRATIC CONSOLIDATION
Abstract
Purpose of Study: This study examined the principal causes of electoral violence in post-conflict countries through an interdisciplinary analysis integrating political science, conflict studies, peacebuilding, and electoral governance.
Problem Statement: Electoral violence remains one of the greatest obstacles to democratic consolidation in post-conflict societies. Although elections are widely regarded as mechanisms for legitimising governments, facilitating peaceful political competition, and consolidating peace agreements, they frequently become catalysts for renewed violence where political institutions remain fragile and wartime grievances unresolved.
Methodology: Drawing upon comparative evidence from Kenya, Côte d'Ivoire, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Burundi, Nepal, Bosnia and Herzegovina, South Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the article argues that electoral violence is rarely caused by elections themselves. Rather, elections become focal points through which pre-existing political, institutional, economic, and social tensions are expressed.
Result: The analysis identified weak state institutions, winner-takes-all political systems, unresolved wartime grievances, ethnic mobilisation, militarised political actors, electoral fraud, youth unemployment, hate speech, misinformation, and ineffective electoral management bodies as the principal drivers of violence. The findings further demonstrates that successful post-conflict elections depend less upon technical electoral administration than upon broader processes of institutional reform, political inclusion, rule of law, and peacebuilding.
Recommendation: Sustainable electoral peace requires transforming political competition from violent confrontation into institutionalised democratic contestation.
Keywords: Electoral violence, Post-conflict elections, Peacebuilding, Democratic consolidation, Electoral management
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