Teaching Comparative Government and Politics

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Election World

Not long after I started teaching comparative politics 20 years ago, I discovered Election World.

It was a site on what then was the new-fangled thing called the World Wide Web. Election World had been created by Wilfried Derksen, a Dutch judge who cataloged election results from all over the world. In addition, Derksen maintained a schedule of upcoming elections. It was and remains an impressive result of much work.

I think that it's worth noting that Election World was one of those idealistic products of the early days of the Web, when the meme was that there be no commercial uses for the WWW. Therefore, it was not surprising that in 2004, Election World became a special part of Wikipedia. It's still edited by Derksen, so it's not run on exactly the same model as the rest of Wikipedia.

Election World is still the source to go to if you want to find election results and schedules.


You will find links at the Election World pages to a similar special Wikipedia section on political parties.

It includes


If you or your students explore these articles and the other pages that are referred to, you'll find a wealth of information.

Just remember, it's Wikipedia. While edited and published sources require skepticism and verification, Wikipedia facts and representations of reality require extra care. But you know that. Do your students?


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