Survey & Exit Polls
SURVEYS
An election exit poll is a survey based on interviews with voters as they leave (or exit) their balloting locations. To estimate the outcome of an election in a particular constituency, a sample of its smallest voting units (often referred to as precincts or polling locations) is drawn and at least one interviewer is assigned to each sampled location on Election Day. On a pre-determined and systematic basis, the interviewer approaches people who have already voted in order to obtain an interview. For example, depending upon the expected number of voters at the sample location, the interviewer may approach every third or fifth person who leaves the voting location. The interviewer usually hands the voter a questionnaire on a clipboard and asks him or her to fill out the questionnaire, fold it up, and deposit it in a survey ballot box. In most instances the exit poll questionnaire is self-administered to protect the privacy of the voter and the confidentiality of each individual’s responses.
The majority of electoral laws establish a specific system for political surveys carried out during electoral periods, with the object of avoiding manipulation of the prospects of the different political groups through this channel that could eventually have an impact on the election results. Among the most commonly adopted measures are:
- regulation on the features a survey must contain in order to be disseminated as such, including for example the name of the company that has conducted it, the date, the size of the sample and other technical details such as the error margin, the sampling system, etc., with all these specifications accompanying the dissemination of the survey
- in conjunction with the foregoing, special powers of control over the dissemination of the surveys are granted to the electoral organisation, that usually include the ability to demand compulsory rectification by the media
The dissemination of surveys is frequently forbidden immediately prior to the elections in countries that are politically as diverse as France and Peru. In view of the globalisation of communications though, it is getting more and more difficult to impose such prohibition. Its purpose is, however, clear: to permit the electoral organisation to order the rectification of surveys that do not meet the legal requirements before the elections are held.
Another mechanism for gathering information about an election in progress–half way between surveys and quick count procedures–normally carried out by communication companies and not by the electoral organisations, is the ‘exit poll’, also called ‘Israeli Surveys’, as this was the first country that put them into practice.
As opposed to electoral surveys, exit polls are not concerned with the intended vote, but are based on the answers given by voters selected at random after they have voted. However, contrary to what occurs in quick count procedures, these are not results that have already been counted and verified after the closing of the polls, but what the person says he has voted. They pose two problems:
In the first place, their reliability can be questionable. One might think that there is no reason why voters in stable democracies should conceal or lie about how they have voted, especially because nobody is under any obligation to answer in an exit poll. But in practice they often do. The majority of exit polls carried out in European countries over the past years have been failures. This phenomenon increases in the countries that are in the process of transition, where the fear in the minds of citizens might be well founded. This can give rise to inaccurate data being circulated, provoking confusion in public opinion and making it difficult for the defeated candidate to accept the results.
In the second place, they might create situations in which problems of relative incompatibility regarding voter’s secrecy could arise.
Because of this, these systems are not at all advisable in countries in a political transition, to the point that on occasions, they have actually been forbidden, as in Bulgaria in 1990.
Their effectiveness in consolidated countries is not clear either, where more and more advanced quick count systems enable real and fully reliable data to be obtained in a very brief period of time.
In short, the exit polls imply additional disruption of the processes in countries in a political transition. In any case, it is a short-lived, costly and rather unreliable mechanism.