ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the existing methodological approaches that have tended to be used in the election sciences so far. Formal-legal institutionalism borrows assumptions and methods from ‘old institutionalism’. The chapter sets out a realist sociological approach to the study of electoral management, which can be contrasted with the rationalist scientific approach which dominates election sciences and has been used in initial approaches. Research on electoral management can and should therefore instruct practice because rigorous, scientific, academic knowledge trumps individual, localised, subjective practitioner knowledge. Electoral officials deal with elections all day, every day. Legal-institutionalist variables were commonly used in early work on electoral management because they tend to be measurable and observable. Norris uses cross-national data on bureaucratic culture, government effectiveness and the formal-legal structure of the electoral management board as independent variables to test for the effects on electoral integrity.
