Äänen pitkä matka : ulkosuomalaisten matala äänestysaktiivisuus ja joustavien äänestysmenetelmien merkitsevyys

Authors

• Johanna Peltoniemi

Abstract

As globalisation, European integration and an increase of migration have made life more mobile, a growing number of countries have enfranchised their emigrant citizens. As previous research (e.g. Braun & Gratschew 2007) has suggested, while the constitutions of many countries guarantee the right to vote for all citizens, in reality external voters are often disenfranchised because of a lack of procedures enabling them to exercise the right. Adoption of convenience voting techniques such as postal voting and overseas constituencies have had a noteworthy impact on higher turnout in Sweden and Italy. The main question asked in this article is: Does the low level of turnout among Finnish emigrants result from lack of motivation or the lack of possibility? The data used in this article was collected in 2014 among Finnish emigrants residing in Sweden, Germany, Great Britain, Spain, Canada and USA (n=1067). The key findings of this article suggest that high costs of voting and the inconvenience of voting method is the overriding reason for the low level of turnout among Finnish emigrants. Adoption of internet voting or other convenience voting technique could therefore be expected to increase overseas turnout in Finnish elections.