Elections

Overview

Kenya is often cited as a country where ethnicity drives the behavior of politicians as well as the electorate. Accordingly, ethnic groups are often mobilized during elections and this has resulted in, for example, persistent election violence over the past decades. While Kenya indisputably has a diverse population, other factors need to be examined to explain what drives peoples’ behaviors during elections. Our research pursues a quantitative approach that is supported by qualitative insights.

Research

We are currently analyzing the drivers of election violence during Kenya’s general elections in 2002, 2007, 2013 and 2017 using data from The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED). A variety of independent variables are being tested for statistical significance in order to predict the magnitude of violence. This comprehensive approach contrasts with most existing studies that focus exclusively on the 2007 post election violence.

In 2017, we explored the voting behavior around Kenya's 2013 general elections of sub-ethnicities within the Maasai community in Kajiado County. Additionally, we analyzed how Kenya’s 2011 constitutional reform affected the behavior of women and minority voters. The data were collected through field research among 600 participants.

The hypotheses of the study were that: 1) sub-ethnicity affects voting behavior for the Maasai voters during the 2013 election, and 2) constitutional reform awareness worked as an intervening behavior.