Electoral symbol

Mural in Kerala showing the hand of the Indian National Congress

An electoral symbol is a standardised symbol allocated to an independent candidate or political party by a country's election commission for use in election ballots.

Usage

Symbols are used by parties in their campaigning, and printed on ballot papers where a voter must make a mark to vote for the associated party. One of their purposes is to facilitate voting by illiterate people, who cannot read candidates' names on ballot papers.^[1]

This may include:

• Easily identifiable real-world creatures, objects, or items.
  • In the United States, the Democratic Party has been associated with imagery of donkeys. This use was derived from opponents of then-president Andrew Jackson insulting him as a "jackass" to characterize his stubbornness, and later popularized in 1870 by political cartoonist Thomas Nast. In 1874, Nast also popularized the contrasting use of an elephant to similarly symbolize the Republican Party.^[2][3]
    • The Republican Party has since used an elephant as part of its official branding. While the donkey is widely-used by Democrats as an unofficial mascot, the party's first official logo—adopted in 2010—is an encircled "D".^[4][3][2] In some regions, the two parties may be associated with other symbols, such as a star and bald eagle respectively.^[5]
  • In India, electoral symbols are assigned by the Election Commission of India, consisting of item(s) visualizing the party's ideology and position. A symbol assigned to a party designated as a national party can not be used by other parties in the country. A symbol assigned to a state party in one state can be allocated to different state party in another state.^[6][7][8]
  • A similar system is used in Pakistan, where parties and candidates must be identified via one of the symbols approved by the Election Commission of Pakistan, such as the Pakistan People's Party arrow, the Pakistan Muslim League (N) tiger, and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf cricket bat (in reference to party founder Imran Khan being a retired player).^[9] The availability and assignments of certain symbols have led to controversies; the book icon has faced criticism from secularist parties who believed that its assignment to Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F) allowed it to be presented as the Quran^[10][1]
• numbers, such as the two-digit electoral numbers in Brazil.
• a letter or small group of letters.
  • One, two, three or four Hebrew letters and additional symbols of one, two, three or four Arabic symbols is used in Israel (this also facilitates voters whose knowledge of Hebrew or Arabic, the two official languages, is limited).^[11]
  • Danish and Icelandic parties are identified by a singular "party letter", which may or may not be the initial letter of the party's name.
• unique party logos or flags.

References

1. "With Pakistan Vote Looming, Ballot Symbols Prove A Tricky Topic". Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. 2012-12-03. Retrieved 2023-08-22.
2. Rodibaugh, Jennifer J. (Spring–Summer 2008). "Cartoonery: When Donkey and Elephant First Clashed". American Heritage. 58 (4). Archived from the original on September 18, 2010. Retrieved June 15, 2018.
3. John William Ward (1962). Andrew Jackson: Symbol for an Age. Oxford Up. pp. 87–88. ISBN 9780199923205.
4. Good, Chris (2010-09-15). "Democratic Party Steals Logo From the Pizza Place Where I Used to Work". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2023-08-22.
5. Tomas Lopez (October 23, 2014). "Poor Ballot Design Hurts New York's Minor Parties ... Again". Brennan Center for Justice. Archived from the original on February 7, 2017. Retrieved February 6, 2017.
6. Michael Gallagher; Paul Mitchell (15 September 2005). The Politics of Electoral Systems. OUP Oxford. p. 142. ISBN 978-0-19-153151-4.
7. Holland, Oscar; Suri, Manveena (2019-04-12). "Ceiling fans, brooms and mangoes: The election symbols of India's political parties". CNN. Retrieved 2023-08-22.
8. Iwanek, Krzysztof. "The Curious Stories of Indian Party Symbols". The Diplomat. Retrieved 2023-08-22.
9. "In Pakistan, election symbols speak louder than words". Arab News. 2018-07-23. Retrieved 2023-08-22.
10. Khattak, Daud (2012-12-04). "The Problem With Using Symbols on Ballots in Pakistan". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2023-08-22.
11. "Israeli Election Day is still surprisingly low-tech". 8 April 2019.