On Sat, May 16, 2009 at 9:04 PM, Thaths <[email protected]> wrote: > > The last couple of general elections (2004, 2009) exit poll > predictions have been significantly different from the actual > outcomes. And the difference is more than the exit poll's margin of > error. Do you have any theories as to why exit polling is so crappy in > India? Is it because of India's size? Diversity? Are Indian voters > tight lipped or lying to psephologists? Does EVM bit bucket stuffing > (if it happens) overwhelming the exit poll's margin of error? > > Thaths > -- > "You'll have to speak up, I'm wearing a towel." -- Homer J. Simpson
I had some experience with MARG who did complaint audits for the organization which I was part of. The problem is the sample survey method. The samples are way too small to be representative and even though the samples are chosen to represent a heterogeneous population, it is still not enough. What also matters is how populations are defined. MARG was specifically asked to determine who many people from the slums used the Compliant Management System we had devised. MARG came back saying 33% of the users were slum dwellers. Who were these slum dwellers they had interviewed and how did they arrive at a definition of what is a slum when in Mumbai, a slum is perhaps the most complicated entity in terms of its composition and heterogeneity? Elections are an even bigger arena and much more complicated than can be imagined. Emma Tarlo, a French anthropologist, did a detailed ethnographic study in a squatter colony in Delhi called "Welcome" and she found some interesting trends on why people in Welcome voted for the Congress after the emergency even though Sanjay Gandhi had unleashed his inhumane sterilization programme on the residents of Welcome. They felt that it was the middlemen in the bureaucratic circles who were more torturous and they deserved to be punished, not Indira Gandhi. I find this comment very instructive. Exit polls cannot capture people's perceptions of what constitutes government, good governance practices, accountability, justice, etc. These are highly subjective notions which change according to contexts. Moreover, there are numerous rationalities at play when it comes to a voting decision. My father, whose factory was burnt down during the riots of 1993 and who was perhaps most paranoid when Gujarat riots of 2002 happened, kept remarking since yesterday, 'BJP lost because of Advani. They should have projected Modi as Prime Minister, then it would have been better." How do I interpret this remark and the rationales behind it? [This is not a Hindu-Muslim issue and please do not make it one. I just found the remark very intriguing, coming from a man whose political views and opinions have given me a lot of food for thought about the meaning of "religion" and "identity"!] -- Zainab Bawa Ph.D. Student and Independent Researcher Gaining Ground ... http://zainab.freecrow.org http://cis-india.org/research/cis-raw/histories-of-the-internet/transparency-and-politics
