This chapter examines the integrity of the Dominican Republic’s political and electoral financing framework, analysing the rules governing public and private funding of political parties and candidates, transparency and disclosure requirements, oversight and enforcement mechanisms, and emerging risks linked to vote-buying, third-party campaigning, and digital political advertising. It identifies key gaps and integrity risks and provides avenues to strengthen fairness, transparency, and accountability in political finance to safeguard democratic competition and public trust.
OECD Integrity Review of the Dominican Republic
Implementing a Strategic Vision for Public Integrity and Anti-Corruption
Abstract
Like lobbying, political finance is a necessary component of the democratic process. It enables individuals and entities to express their preferences by supporting the candidates and political parties they consider to best represent their interests and values. At the same time, political financing constitutes an essential resource for candidates and parties to compete in elections and to communicate their ideas, programmes and manifestos, thereby supporting electoral competition and broadening political choice for citizens (OECD, 2016[1]).
However, as with lobbying, in the absence of adequate safeguards around the financing of political parties and electoral campaigns, financial resources may become instruments of undue influence and policy capture (OECD, 2017[2]). In certain circumstances, political financing can result in the overrepresentation of narrow or well-resourced interests at the expense of broader societal or market considerations. There is also a risk that parties and candidates, once in office, become more responsive to the interests of specific donors than to the wider public interest. Donors may, in turn, expect forms of reciprocity for contributions made during electoral campaigns, including privileged access to information, preferential lobbying opportunities, overpriced public contracts, favourable conditions in public loans, or other undue or illegal benefits from public authorities (OECD, 2016[1]).
Over time, these dynamics can undermine the quality and effectiveness of decision making in legislative and executive bodies, leading to biased, less effective or overly burdensome regulations that raise barriers to entry and distort competition. Ultimately, weaknesses in the regulation and oversight of political financing can result in poorer democratic and economic outcomes for citizens and businesses alike (OECD, 2016[1]; OECD, 2024[3]).
Beyond traditional political financing of parties and candidates, electoral campaigns can now be influenced through an expanding array of digital and non-financial means that pose both opportunities and risks for democratic processes. Third-party campaigning by non-contestant organisations can shape public debate and resource flows outside formal party structures, potentially circumventing existing finance regulations and transparency requirements. The proliferation of social media, online political advertisements and integrated digital campaigns has transformed how political messaging reaches voters, allowing actors to shape narratives and influence the feeds that guide public opinion. Increasingly powered by artificial intelligence, these campaigns enable actors to target, amplify, and adapt messages at scale. Digitalisation also introduces challenges in tracing spending and identifying the sponsors behind political content, including when intermediaries, opaque networks or cross-border service providers are involved. These dynamics can be exploited by foreign state or state-linked actors through malign influence and interference operations – such as covert financing, co-ordinated inauthentic behaviour, and the amplification of polarising or misleading content – to distort the information environment, erode trust, and undermine electoral integrity (OECD, 2021[4]; OECD, 2024[5]; IDEA, 2021[6]).
Taken together, these trends underscore the need for regulatory frameworks and oversight mechanisms that address not only direct financial contributions, but the full spectrum of third-party and digital influence in order to ensure transparency and integrity in the financing of political parties and electoral campaigns, which are essential for effective policymaking and strong democracies. The OECD Recommendation on Public Integrity (OECD, 2017[7]), the OECD Recommendation on Transparency and Integrity in Lobbying and Influence (OECD, 2010[8]), and the OECD Recommendation on Information Integrity (OECD, 2024[9]) set out the main pillars for enhancing transparency and Integrity in the financing of political parties and electoral campaigns. This includes, among other measures:
Providing timely and reliable information on electoral processes to enable citizens to exercise their rights.
Disclose online in an open data and easily accessible format, that is reusable for public scrutiny, information about donations and contributions, within a reasonable threshold, received by political parties and election campaigns.
Strengthening transparency over online political advertising and aligning these transparency requirements for online advertising with existing rules governing electoral and other media advertising.
Ensure frameworks are in place for lobbying and influence actors to make accessible to the public pertinent information on their activities aimed at persuading any section of the public or the media with regard to electoral processes, either directly or through third parties.
In the Dominican Republic, the framework governing political parties, electoral campaigns, and elections is relatively recent, particularly in terms of systems for control, accountability, and transparency of political financing. While national and local elections have been held regularly since 1966, elections conducted prior to 1996 were not widely regarded as fully free and fair. Since the rise to power of the Partido de la Liberación Dominicana (PLD) in 1996, elections have generally met democratic standards, consolidating the country’s status as an electoral democracy, and political parties are generally free to form and operate. Over the past three decades, successive governments from three different political parties have made progress toward building a sustainable, market-based economy, advancing regulatory reforms in political campaigning and promoting greater public participation in civic life (Bertelsmann Stiftung, 2024[10]; Freedom House, 2024[11]).
Notably, substantial reforms were implemented to better regulate private financing, establish limits on campaign spending, and strengthen the mechanisms for auditing and monitoring political parties. The principles of equity, freedom, and transparency in electoral campaigns and processes are enshrined in Articles 211 and 212, paragraph IV, of the Constitution, but the regulations governing political party financing are contained in secondary laws and implementing regulations. As emphasised in Chapter 1, the two main legal frameworks in the Dominican Republic are Law No. 33-2018 on political parties, groups, and movements, which defines the types of permitted financing, and Organic Electoral Regime Law No. 20-2023 (replacing Organic Electoral Regime Law No. 15-2019), which establishes transparency obligations for the use of campaign resources (OECD, 2026[12]). Institutionally, the electoral system is structured around three main bodies with distinct and complementary mandates:
The Central Electoral Board (Junta Central Electoral, JCE) is responsible for organising and administering elections, regulating political parties and overseeing compliance with electoral rules.
The Superior Electoral Tribunal (Tribunal Superior Electoral, TSE) serves as the specialised judicial body responsible for resolving electoral disputes and adjudicating conflicts related to political parties and electoral processes.
The Specialised Prosecutor’s Office for the Investigation and Prosecution of Electoral Crimes and Offences (Procuraduría Especializada para la Investigación y Persecución de los Crímenes y Delitos Electorales, PECDE), governed by Organic Law No. 133-2011 of the Public Prosecutor’s Office and hierarchically attached to the Attorney General’s Office (Procuraduría General de la República, PGR o Ministerio Público) through the General Directorate of Prosecution (Dirección General de Persecución del Ministerio Público), is responsible for investigating and prosecuting electoral crimes and offences before the ordinary criminal courts, such as vote buying, electoral fraud, coercion of voters, misuse of public resources, or violations of campaign finance rules where criminal liability may arise.
The adoption of Law No. 33-2018 and Organic Law No. 20-2023 has brought the legal framework governing the financing of political parties and election campaigns in the Dominican Republic more in line with international standards and good practices. However, significant implementation gaps persist, limiting the effective enforcement of existing rules. As a result, and as measured against OECD standards on political finance, the Dominican Republic fulfils 90% of criteria on regulations, but only 14% of criteria on practice, compared to the OECD average of 76% and 58%, respectively (Figure 9.1).
Note: This set of indicators covers regulations and practice related to political finance. The criteria are from the OECD Public Integrity Indicators’ datasets on “Regulatory framework for transparency in lobbying, conflict-of-interest and political finance” and “Use of oversight and prevention mechanisms for financing of political parties and election campaigns”. Data for 2025, or latest year available. Data not provided by Japan and Switzerland.
How to read: On average, in 2025 Argentina fulfilled 90% of criteria on regulation and 71% on practice. OECD Member countries are represented by dark blue bars. OECD partner countries are represented by light blue bars. OECD Member, partner and global averages are represented by red bars.
Source: (OECD, 2026[13]).
Concretely, Law No. 33-2018 on Political parties, Groups and Movements bans anonymous donations, contributions – including in-kind contributions – from foreign states and enterprises, publicly owned enterprises, as well as contributions made by individuals under pressure from their hierarchical superiors (Article 64). It establishes a threshold for private contributions to candidate campaigns’ and sets a ceiling for electoral campaign expenses for parties and candidates, though it does not impose limits on third-party expenditures. Candidates and political parties are required to report financial information on funding and expenses at the beginning and end of electoral campaigns to the JCE, which publishes these reports on its website. Political parties are also required to submit annual reports, which the JCE publishes in full on its website and provides an extract to a nationally distributed newspaper. Contributions to political parties where sources cannot be identified, are considered illicit (OECD, 2026[12]) (Table 9.1).
To prevent those in power from supporting their own political parties with state resources, Law No. 33-2018 also prohibits political parties from receiving donations or gifts from any branch of government and bans the use of public funds for any activity that has “electoral profitability”. This includes, for example, the official inauguration of public works during pre-campaign and campaign periods (Article 59).
The Dominican Republic fulfils 9 out of 10 criteria for regulation (90%)
Note: The criteria are from the OECD Public Integrity Indicators’ datasets on “Regulatory framework for transparency in lobbying, conflict-of-interest and political finance” and “Use of oversight and prevention mechanisms for financing of political parties and election campaigns”.
Source: OECD Public Integrity Indicators database, https://oecd-public-integrity-indicators.org/ (as of 10 March 2026).
Despite these existing regulations, transparency in political finance remains limited in practice. The current reporting requirements are overly vague, granting political parties wide latitude in how they interpret and fulfil them. As a result, financial reports submitted by political parties often fail to provide meaningful insight into the allocation and use of funds. In addition, the auditing and enforcement powers of the JCE remain weak, and not all political parties represented in Parliament comply with financial reporting obligations. For example, in 2021, eleven parties failed to submit their annual accounts for the 2020 electoral cycle within the deadlines set by law (OECD, 2026[12]) (Table 9.2).
The Dominican Republic fulfills 1 out of 7 criteria for practice (14%)
Note: The criteria are from the OECD Public Integrity Indicators’ datasets on “Regulatory framework for transparency in lobbying, conflict-of-interest and political finance” and “Use of oversight and prevention mechanisms for financing of political parties and election campaigns”.
Source: OECD Public Integrity Indicators, https://oecd-public-integrity-indicators.org/.
In addition to the challenges related to undue influence and opaque decision making discussed in Chapter 8 on lobbying, the influence of illicit financing and money laundering on elections and policymaking remains a serious risk given the country’s ongoing struggle with organised crime syndicates (IFES, 2021[14]). Stakeholders interviewed for this report also highlighted the existence of entrenched alliances and collusive arrangements between political parties and certain influential economic actors who then receive special consideration from elected officials.
Finally, practices of vote buying and political patronage have been observed at the local level, although vote-buying is classified as a criminal offense, punishable by one to three years of imprisonment under Organic Law No. 20-2023. For instance, during the municipal elections of February 2024, independent observers from the NGO Participación Ciudadana and the Electoral Observation Mission of the Organisation of American States (EOM/OAS) “confirmed cases of vote buying by political forces and, in some polling stations, situations that bordered on voter harassment”, prompting intervention by the Electoral Military Police (OAS, 2024[15]). The distribution of goods and consumer services to citizens during campaign periods have also become normalised over time. Cases where voters are transported by buses to cast ballots in different districts or are paid in exchange for showing a photo of their marked ballot, can distort electoral outcomes, particularly given the high abstention rate recorded in the municipal elections, which reached 53% (OAS, 2024[15]). Moreover, electoral fraud undermines the integrity of the electoral process and weakens democracy, regardless of whether or not it affects the final outcome of the vote (IFES, 2021[16]). Since 2012, Participación Ciudadana (PC) has implemented the initiative “Atento con Tu Voto” (“Watch Your Vote”), a tool designed to directly address vote buying by enabling the public to monitor electoral processes and report irregularities and potential electoral crimes in their communities.
Biased public spending, often referred to as “pork barrelling” and defined as the use of public funds to target specific electoral districts or voter groups for political gain rather than based on objective needs, also remains a recurring issue in the Dominican Republic. Research and public debate suggest that government resources are often used strategically during election years to influence electoral outcomes, particularly through increased social spending. Analysts have noted that this pattern involves a surge in public expenditures before elections, followed by a sharp decline afterward. Opposition parties frequently complain about the government's regular promotion of its public works, particularly during election periods. This promotion extends beyond public media, with substantial amounts also spent on government advertising in private media outlets (IFES, 2021[14]). Such practices undermine institutional integrity and contribute to public perceptions that election outcomes are influenced by the misuse of state resources (IFES, 2021[16]).
According to recent international surveys, parties are considered the most corrupt institution in the Dominican Republic. For example, a survey conducted by the World Justice Project in 2022 found that approximately 59% of respondents in the Dominican Republic believe that most or all members of Dominican political parties are involved in corrupt practices (World Justice Project, 2023[17]). Similarly, the 2023 results from the Latinobarómetro showed that political parties were the least trusted institution in the Dominican Republic, with 77.2% of respondents reporting little to no trust in political parties (Latinobarómetro, 2024[18]). These findings align with results from the Encuesta de Cultura Democrática conducted by the Ministry of Economy of the Dominican Republic, which indicate that the institutions with the lowest levels of public trust are the Legislative Branch, political parties (21%), and the National Police, while the Central Electoral Board (JCE) stands out as one of the institutions enjoying comparatively higher levels of trust, at 39.1% (Ministry of Economy, Planning and Development, 2024[19]).
The suspension of the February 2020 municipal elections, following major technical failures affecting the electronic voting system, represented a significant challenge for public trust in the electoral system. The disruption, which led to the nationwide suspension of the elections on voting day, triggered considerable public concern and intensified scrutiny of the credibility and resilience of electoral institutions. In response, the JCE implemented a range of institutional, operational and transparency-oriented reforms aimed at restoring trust in the electoral process. These measures included strengthening safeguards and audits related to electoral technologies, enhancing co-operation with electoral observation missions, expanding communication and voter information efforts, increasing transparency around electoral operations and vote counting procedures, and strengthening engagement with political parties and civil society actors (OAS, 2020[20]).
Still, various stakeholders interviewed for this report confirmed the need to review the parameters governing political party financing to enhance transparency and accountability. Representatives of the JCE emphasised that ensuring transparency and integrity in political finance requires both stronger legal provisions and more effective enforcement mechanisms. They also confirmed that the institution has submitted to Congress in 2021 two draft bills aimed at improving the current regulatory framework (Junta Central Electoral, 2021[21]). Accordingly, this chapter reviews strengths and opportunities for improvement with respect to strengthening transparency and integrity in the financing of political parties and electoral campaign in the Dominican Republic, and proposes tailored recommendations along the following priorities:
Establishing fair and transparent rules for public and private funding of political parties and candidates.
Strengthening reporting, transparency and enforcement in political party financing.
Addressing transparency gaps in third-party, online and digitally enabled electoral campaigning.
Transparent, equitable, and well-designed rules governing the public and private financing of political parties and candidates are essential to safeguard democratic competition, prevent undue influence, and strengthen public trust in the political system. Public funding can help ensure a level playing field and support the institutional development of political parties, while appropriately regulated private funding allows for citizen participation without compromising political integrity (OECD, 2016[1]). This section examines the Dominican Republic’s framework for political financing, focusing on the allocation of public resources and the regulation of private contributions, and identifies opportunities to enhance equity, transparency, and resilience to corruption risks in line with international and OECD standards.
9.2.1. The allocation of public funding to political parties could be improved by establishing more proportional eligibility criteria in Law No. 33-2018
Public funding is a common component of political finance systems and may contribute to financing political parties' representative functions, daily operations, internal organisation, and electoral campaigns (OECD, 2020[22]). Under Electoral Law No. 275-1997, now repealed and replaced by Laws No. 33-2018 and 20-2023, the Dominican Republic allocated 0.50% of the national budget to political parties in election years and 0.25% in non-election years. As these allocations were tied to the size of the national budget, the overall amount distributed fluctuated annually in line with public expenditure and generally increased over time. The current legal framework no longer specifies how the share of the national budget allocated to political parties is calculated, potentially allowing for discretion in the allocation of resources.
To qualify for public funding, political parties must receive at least 0.01% of the vote. This threshold is the lowest in Latin America and is lower than those used in OECD countries. The total amount of public funds allocated annually to political parties, as outlined in Article 61 of Law No. 33-2018, follows a tiered formula that has evolved over time:
80% is distributed in equal shares among parties that received more than 5% of the votes in the most recent election.
12% is divided equally among parties that secured between 1% and 5% of the vote.
8% is allocated equally to parties that received between 0.01% and 1% of the vote.
In addition to direct funding, Law No. 33-2018 grants political parties, alliances, coalitions, and independent candidates free airtime on public television and radio during campaigns, allocated according to the principles of equity and equality (Articles 187 and 188). Regarding expenditure, Article 63 of Law No. 33-2018 defines three primary purposes for the use of public funding: 10% must be allocated to training and civic education activities, 50% to cover operational and administrative expenses and 40% to support candidates running for elected office, including presidential, congressional, and municipal positions.
However, studies on the political party system in the Dominican Republic found that the tiered allocation model reduces equity in electoral competition by setting a maximum cap of 20% of state funding for smaller political organisations like political groups and movements that only contest at local levels, while at the same time triggering the proliferation of new political parties, leading to excessive fragmentation in the party system (IFES, 2021[14]; Participación Ciudanada, 2025[23]). According to the JCE, as of April 2025, the Dominican Republic had 35 political parties with national reach, compared to 16 in 2000, 28 in 2010, and 32 in 2020, in addition to political movements that operate at regional or municipal levels, and political groups at the provincial level. This challenge was further compounded by an April 2021 ruling from the Constitutional Court (decision TC/0146/21), which overturned the previous requirement that parties must obtain at least 1% of the vote to retain legal status. The new decision allows minor parties to maintain their registration as long as they win a congressional or municipal seat.
Overall, this environment tends to favour larger, more institutionalised parties by granting them significantly more resources than their smaller counterparts. At the same time, the most-voted party may receive the same public funding as one that only achieved 6% of the vote. In some cases, the amount of funding received per vote by the most-supported party can be up to 40 times lower than that received by the least-supported party. This impedes the renewal of the party system by enabling declining political parties to preserve their operational capacity for extended periods, despite having lost significant popular support and without being compelled to reengage with voters or rebuild electoral legitimacy.
Under such conditions, the incentives of smaller parties tend to become distorted, often reducing their ambitions to merely securing a share of public financing without genuine social backing, rather than genuinely competing for elected office. This results in the proliferation of opportunistic satellite parties that function as extensions of major parties, shifting their loyalties strategically to support whichever dominant party is in power. Such dynamics perpetuate clientelism and the inefficient use of public resources, while obstructing the emergence and growth of competitive, representative political alternatives (Participación Ciudanada, 2025[23]).
These distortions prompted 20 political parties, movements, and groupings to file motions of opposition and review against the JCE in 2021 regarding the methodology used to calculate and distribute state subsidies. To clarify which election results should serve as the reference point for allocating public funding (whether presidential, legislative, or municipal elections), the JCE first adopted Regulation No. 01-2021 establishing that the valid vote share for calculating public funding should be based on the aggregate votes obtained by each party in the elections for deputies, senators, and the presidency. Following legal challenges filed by several political parties, the JCE subsequently adopted Resolution No. 05-2021, which expanded the calculation to include the results of municipal elections in the allocation formula, but this resolution was also contested. More recently, Resolution No. 7-2025 introduced a new approach, establishing that the categorisation of political parties for funding purposes would be based on the highest percentage of votes obtained by each party in any of the three electoral levels (presidential, senatorial, or deputy) during the general elections held on 19 May 2024 (Junta Central Electoral, 2025[24]). However, this resolution was again challenged before the Superior Electoral Tribunal, which issued Judgment TSE/010/2025, establishing a new criterion for the distribution of public funds. The Tribunal interpreted the term “última elección” (last election) in Article 61.2 of Law No. 33-2018 as referring to the entire electoral cycle, encompassing both the municipal elections of February 2024 together with the presidential and congressional elections of May 2024. The judgement therefore ruled that the categorisation of political organisations for public financing purposes should be based on the total number of valid votes obtained by each party across all electoral contests in which it participated during that cycle (presidential, senate, deputies, mayors, councillors, district directors, and district board members), calculated as a percentage of the total valid votes cast nationwide.
Taken together, these successive legislative changes, legal challenges and judicial interpretations have repeatedly altered the methodology used to determine public funding for political parties. This evolving framework creates significant legal uncertainty and unpredictability for political actors, and the frequent revisions to the applicable rules risk undermining the stability and transparency that are essential for an effective system of political finance regulation. JCE representatives interviewed for this report also acknowledged the need for reform and expressed support for a more proportional allocation model.
As such, Law No. 33-2018 could be amended to clearly specify in the legal framework which elections are to be considered for calculating public funding and establish a new formula that combines an equal base allocation with a proportional component tied directly to electoral performance.
In its proposed reform of Law No. 33-2018, the JCE put forward amendments aimed at clarifying the criteria governing the distribution of public funding to political parties, groupings and movements. In particular, the proposal revised the wording of Article 61 to establish a more predictable allocation mechanism. Under the proposed provision, 30% of the State contribution would be distributed equally among all political parties, including newly recognised parties, regardless of their electoral performance. The remaining 70% would be allocated proportionally based on the valid votes obtained by each political organisation across the presidential, senatorial, deputy and municipal elections (Junta Central Electoral, 2021[21]).
The proposal would bring the framework more closely into line with common practices across OECD countries, where the most prevalent approach to allocating public funding is to distribute resources on the basis of past electoral performance, typically in proportion to the share of votes or seats obtained in previous elections. This model rewards past performance in a proportional manner and provides greater financial stability to parties that maintain electoral support. Another approach is equal allocation, whereby all parties or candidates receive the same amount of public funding regardless of their electoral results. While this system can encourage political competition and facilitate the participation of new entrants, it may also create incentives for the proliferation of political parties, particularly in the absence of electoral thresholds. Some countries therefore adopt mixed systems, combining a portion of funding distributed equally among parties with another portion allocated proportionally based on electoral performance. Such an approach can help strike a balance between ensuring a level playing field for smaller parties while maintaining incentives linked to electoral support. A third model, used in some jurisdictions, involves performance-based reimbursements, whereby political parties receive public funding after elections to cover part of their campaign expenses, depending on the number of votes or seats obtained (OECD, 2016[1]; IDEA, n.d.[25]). By balancing equal access to public resources with incentives linked to electoral support, JCE’s proposal could help promote fair political competition while preserving incentives for parties to maintain genuine electoral backing. The Dominican Republic is therefore encouraged to continue pursuing reforms along these lines.
To help curb the growth of parties without popular support that may exist primarily to benefit from state resources, a complementary approach would be to require political parties to meet a minimum vote threshold or secure legislative seats to qualify for public funding. As suggested by Participación Ciudadana, the entry threshold for financial support could be raised to 1% of the valid vote, aligning it with the 1% national vote threshold set out in Article 73 of Law No. 33-2018 as a requirement for maintaining a party’s legal status.
In OECD countries, the eligibility criteria for receiving public funds is usually based on the share of votes in elections (as in France, Australia or Mexico) or their representation in elected bodies (as in the United Kingdom, Austria or Japan). These criteria assure the allocation of public funds to legitimate political contenders and avoid incentivising the creation of parties and candidatures with the sole objective of receiving state resources (OECD, 2017[2]; OECD, 2020[22]). Examples of electoral thresholds for access to public funding for political parties in Latin America are provided in Table 9.3.
Notes: The table reports the principal eligibility criteria and does not capture the full allocation formulas applicable to different categories of public funding. In countries with both a requirement for minimum electoral support and a representation criterion (Chile, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Peru and the Dominican Republic), parties may qualify by meeting either the electoral support threshold or the representation criterion.
1. Brazil: Under the cláusula de desempenho (performance clause), the electoral threshold increased progressively. For the 2026 electoral cycle, parties must obtain 3% of valid votes for the Chamber of Deputies, distributed across at least one-third of the states, in addition to meeting the legal requirements established by the Constitution.
2. Colombia: public funding is allocated according to a mixed formula. While parties must obtain at least 3% of the valid votes in elections for the House of Representatives to retain legal status, part of the distribution of public funding is also based on the number of seats obtained in Congress.
Source: Adapted from (Participación Ciudanada, 2025[23]) and IDEA Political Finance Database
9.2.2. To better frame private funding and promote a balanced funding model between public and private sources, individual private donations could be capped at a fixed amount
A balanced mix of public and private funding helps political parties maintain independence from undue influence while ensuring sufficient resources for democratic competition. In particular, private funding from citizens is widely recognised as a fundamental right (OECD, 2016[1]). In the Dominican Republic, Article 59 of Law No. 33-2018 specifies that the assets of political parties consist of:
Public funds, the amount of which is calculated according to the eligibility criteria discussed in Section 9.2.1.
Contributions from individuals, which must not exceed 1% of the maximum amount allocated to the party receiving the largest share of public funding (Article 63 Paragraph 1 of Law No. 33-2018). During pre-campaign and campaign periods, contributions may not exceed 1% of the established spending limits determined for each type of election (maximum spending limits for pre-campaign activities are established in Article 42 of Law No. 33-2018 whereas maximum campaign spending limits for political parties and candidates are established in Articles 219 and 220 of Organic Law No. 20-2023 on the Electoral Regime).
The parties’ own assets. Permissible sources of funding include membership fees, fundraising events, bank loans (which must be approved by the highest-level executive bodies of the parties), legacies income from activities such as raffles, dinners, parties and bond sales, as well as other lawful sources.
One of the key challenges identified in the Dominican Republic is the predominance of private funding in political party financing. Notably, some of the largest political parties – including those receiving up to 80% of public funding – have submitted financial reports showing that private contributions exceeded public funding by 30% to 40%. As the 1% limit described above can translate into significant sums, compared to OECD practices provided in Table 9.4, the current approach results in relatively high donation limits, raising questions as to whether it effectively mitigates the risk of undue influence or capture of the political finance system by private interests. For instance, in 2024, total public funding disbursed to political parties amounted to approximately DOP 5 041 600 000. Under a scenario where two parties each surpass the 5% vote threshold, the 1% donation cap for the party receiving the highest allocation would equal DOP 29 166 400 (roughly USD 331 708.04). As a result, the political landscape is characterised by a concentration of power among a few well-funded, dominant parties, alongside a proliferation of smaller parties with limited visibility and little realistic prospect of competing for power.
The experience and literature on political finance highlights how an overreliance on private funding may undermine the quality of democracy. Donors may expect a form of reciprocity for donations made during an election campaign, for example getting privileged access to information or to overpriced public contracts, receiving favourable conditions in public loans or other forms of illegal benefits from the respective public administration (OECD, 2017[2]).
Note: In Korea, political funds can only be contributed through a PFA (Direct contribution to a political party or candidate is prohibited).
Source: International IDEA, Political Finance Database, https://www.idea.int/data-tools/data/political-finance-database (accessed 5 March 2026).
In addition, although rules exist for reporting the sources of private donations, transparency remains limited in practice, as further explored in Section 9.3.1. This lack of effective oversight creates opportunities for private interests to exert disproportionate influence over the political process, potentially pressuring elected officials to serve donors’ agendas rather than those of the electorate. As previously discussed, the Dominican Republic also faces serious risks of illicit funds entering the political system, which can distort democratic competition, weaken public institutions, and erode trust in electoral outcomes.
To better fame private funding and promote a balanced funding model between public and private sources, the legal framework could be amended to introduce a fixed ceiling on individual donations, rather than tying limits to a percentage of the spending limits or of the maximum amount allocated to the party receiving the largest share of public funding. In designing such ceilings, careful consideration is essential: if the limits are set too low, they may incentivise informal or illicit financing; if too high, they may fail to level the playing field or curb undue influence. Appropriately calibrated limits would support a more balanced mix of public and private funding in the Dominican Republic. In turn, a higher share of public financing could help reduce dependence on private interests, safeguard party autonomy, and foster more electoral competition (OECD, 2016[1]).
Appropriately calibrated limits would support a more balanced mix of public and private funding in the Dominican Republic.
Effective political finance frameworks depend not only on clear rules on how parties and candidates may raise and spend funds, but also on robust transparency requirements and credible enforcement to deter non-compliance and illicit practices. In the Dominican Republic, recent reforms have strengthened reporting obligations and expanded the role of the Central Electoral Board (JCE), including through new digital tools and administrative sanctioning procedures. Nevertheless, persistent gaps in the specificity and consistency of financial disclosures, limitations in auditing and verification capacity, and weak or inconsistent sanctioning continue to undermine accountability and create opportunities for irregular financing and vote-buying. This section examines key shortcomings and proposes avenues to strengthen the disclosure regime, oversight arrangements, and enforcement tools, including measures to more effectively prevent and sanction clientelist practices.
9.3.1. To improve the consistency and completeness of the financial reports submitted by political parties, Law No. 33-2018 and Organic Law No. 20-2023 could be amended to include more specific criteria and enhanced auditing processes
Transparency is a fundamental pillar of effective political finance regulation. By requiring political parties and candidates to disclose comprehensive and meaningful financial information, transparency helps reveal who is funding political activity, how resources are raised and spent, and what private interests may be influencing the democratic process (OECD, 2017[2]).
In the Dominican Republic, Law No. 33-2018 requires political parties to submit annual financial reports to the JCE within six months following the end of the fiscal year. Failure to comply may result in the suspension of monthly public funding disbursements (Article 68). Upon submission, the JCE must formally approve or reject each report; if no decision is issued within six months, the report is automatically deemed “approved and valid”. To promote public access and accountability, the full reports must be published on the JCE’s transparency portal, with a summary also appearing in a nationally circulated newspaper (Article 70). To meet these reporting obligations, political parties are required to implement specific accounting mechanisms outlined in Articles 69 and 71. They must:
Maintain a comprehensive accounting system that records all income (public and private funding, income from the party’s own activities, contributions from candidates), credits, loans and investments as well as all financial, operational and administrative expenditures (including personal, acquisition of goods and services),
Keep a register of donations and contributors with their names, surnames and tax identification data for proper identification. Contributions made through the internet and social networks are included, and all sources must be identified. The register must be kept in accordance with Law No. 200-2004 on open access to public information and may be reviewed annually by the JCE.
Appoint a financial officer (treasurer or secretary) who will be responsible for managing the party’s income and expenditures.
Regarding political campaigns, Organic Law No. 20-2023 on the Electoral Regime, which builds upon its predecessors, Organic Law No. 15-2019 and Electoral Law No. 275-1997, introduced significant advancements in the areas of transparency, accountability, and enforcement within the Dominican Republic’s electoral framework. Notably, Title X of the law, addressing “Budget, Campaign Expenses, and Electoral Advertising,” strengthened financial reporting obligations and expanded the oversight authority of the JCE.
As part of campaign preparations, political parties are required to submit a general campaign expenditure budget (“presupuesto general de gastos”) outlining the party’s overall electoral spending, along with individual budgets for each candidate. These budgets must include a list of potential donors, income sources, projected revenues, and estimated expenses (Article 218). The submission must take place within 30 days following the publication of the JCE resolution that sets campaign spending limits (Article 220, paragraph 4). All contributions received, whether as donations, transfers, or loans, must be accounted for to determine the total income received (Article 218, paragraph 1). Furthermore, candidates must submit detailed income and expenditure reports to the JCE at both the start of their official candidacy and at the conclusion of the electoral process (Article 218, paragraph 2). Finally, political parties, groups and movements are required to submit to the JCE, and publish electronically, a comprehensive report of all income and expenditures incurred before, during, and after the electoral process. This report must include detailed information on the management, administration, and accounting of all received funds, and must adhere to the audit indicators and standards established by the Chamber of Accounts (Cámara de Cuentas) (Article 222).
In terms of oversight, Law No. 33-2018 marked a significant step forward with the creation and institutionalisation of the Specialised Directorate for Financial Oversight of Political Parties, Groups, and Movements (Dirección Especializada de Control Financiero de Partidos, Agrupaciones y Movimientos Políticos) under Article 67. Housed within the JCE, this Directorate serves as the main authority responsible for supervising the finances of political parties and electoral movements. To facilitate disclosures, the JCE established an online Electoral Auditing System platform (Sistema Integrado de Fiscalización Electoral – SIFE), designed for monitoring, controlling, and auditing campaign finance. In parallel, Article 68 requires political parties to establish their own internal financial control units, which must co-ordinate closely with the Specialised Directorate.
Historically, financial oversight was shared between the Chamber of Accounts and the JCE. Under the now-repealed Electoral Law No. 275-1997, the Chamber of Accounts was tasked with auditing public funds allocated to parties, while the JCE monitored both public and private funding through its specialised unit. However, this dual system presented practical limitations. The Chamber of Accounts often released audit reports years after the end of the fiscal period, lacked enforcement powers, and simply forwarded findings of irregularities to the JCE, none of which ever resulted in sanctions.
Under the current framework, the Specialised Directorate assumes a more central and proactive role. It collaborates with political parties’ internal oversight units to monitor compliance with both public and private financing rules. Its core responsibilities include verifying eligibility for public funding, assessing the effectiveness of internal oversight mechanisms, auditing public funds to ensure lawful expenditure, issuing regulations for reporting during the pre-campaign period, and performing any additional functions assigned by law. This consolidation of oversight functions into a single, empowered entity was designed to improve accountability and enforcement in political finance.
However, despite the reforms introduced through Laws No. 33-2018 and 20-2023, significant transparency and accountability challenges in political finance persist in the Dominican Republic. While these laws aimed to improve financial reporting, many political parties continue to submit vague and incomplete campaign finance reports. According to the IFES and civil society groups such as Participación Ciudadana, although income data is generally more disaggregated and includes donor names and contribution amounts, expenditure disclosures remain opaque and often lack fundamental accounting details (such as unit prices, quantities, total costs, procurement processes and supporting invoices), making it difficult to verify how funds were used. The failure of many political parties to use the standardised reporting templates provided by the JCE has also results in a lack of uniformity in how financial information is reported (IFES, 2021[14]; Participación Ciudanada, 2025[23]). In addition, some political organisations also still fail to separate public and private funds into distinct bank accounts, and JCE officials confirmed that donor identification remains limited due to high levels of anonymity, despite legal requirements to match contributions with ID numbers.
Another recurring issue concerns the way political parties record services and payments made to third parties. Some lack proper documentation to validate expenses corresponding to purchases of goods and services, while others engage informal or unregistered providers. The JCE acknowledged that it currently lacks sufficient tools to ensure transparency over these service-related transactions, which considerably undermines the legality and verifiability of campaign spending. In response, it is developing a new digital application that will require parties to report services received and paid for, linked directly to the official registry of company identification to improve verification and oversight.
The JCE has also highlighted challenges in monitoring candidate registration and reserve lists, noting that some political parties fail to register their candidates within the required timeframe, with no penalties in place for non-compliance.
Lastly, beyond the content of financial reports, political parties and candidates frequently fail to submit them altogether. In 2024, the OAS reported widespread non-compliance with transparency and accountability obligations. Just three days before the election, only 384 out of 1 723 candidates had registered on the Electoral Auditing System platform, and only 52 had submitted any income or expenditure data. This lack of accountability stood in stark contrast to the visibility of the campaigns themselves, which were marked by intensive electioneering and widespread political propaganda on the streets and social media. The failure to comply with reporting obligations makes it impossible to reliably determine how candidacies were financed or how much was spent. As a result, at the time of data collection for the OECD Public Integrity Indicators, the Central Electoral Board’ online repository did not contain a complete record of annual accounts and financial reports submitted by political parties over the past five years.
Taken together, these persistent challenges contribute to a significant and ongoing transparency gap in political finance. This is reflected in the Dominican Republic’s score of 0.627 on the disclosure of campaign donations indicator, as measured by the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Index, highlighting the country’s limited ability to ensure full and accurate disclosure of political funding sources (Figure 9.2).
Note: The V-Dem indicator Disclosure of Campaign Donations (C) (v2eldonate) measures the extent to which national election campaign donations are subject to disclosure requirements and whether these requirements are observed and enforced. A higher score on this indicator reflects stronger transparency rules, including requirements to report the identity of donors, the amounts contributed, and the timing of such disclosures, either before or after elections. The indicator captures both the legal framework and the degree to which these rules are enforced in practice, providing insight into the openness and accountability of campaign finance systems. Scores range from 0 (“No disclosure requirements”) to 4 (“Comprehensive disclosure requirements that are observed and enforced almost all the time”).
Source: Varieties of Democracy (V-DEM) Index, https://www.v-dem.net/
There are several reasons that help explain the persistent transparency gap in political finance reporting in the Dominican Republic. The first is the persistent ambiguity in the legal framework, which undermines enforcement and enables continued non-compliance by political parties. Rather than being grounded in binding legal obligations, the JCE’s efforts to establish orderly accounting practices rely largely on non-mandatory recommendations, guidelines, and templates. For instance, the law does not clearly define key concepts such as the “general expense budget” (“presupuesto general de gastos”), which weakens oversight by making it difficult to assess whether reported revenues and expenditures are consistent with planned budgets. JCE officials have pointed out that a formal, legal definition of campaign and party budgets is urgently needed. In the absence of such clarity, political parties often model their reporting behaviour on each other, resulting in a race to the bottom where minimal compliance becomes the norm. To address this, the JCE has focused its efforts on developing templates, creating an online platform for financial disclosures (the SIFE), and monitoring the submission of annual and campaign reports. These actions have improved public access to information but have yet to produce full and consistent compliance.
A second key reason behind the transparency gap is the JCE’s limited auditing capacity, which undermines effective oversight of private contributions and compliance with campaign spending limits. While post-electoral audits are conducted, the JCE lacks access to crucial information to verify whether donations exceed legal thresholds or come from prohibited sources, and it has no authority over third-party service providers. Its ability to trace the flow of political donations is further hampered by weak collaboration with banks, financial institutions, and anti-money laundering authorities. Investigations are typically handled through dialogue with the political party concerned, as the JCE cannot request financial records from banks, severely limiting its investigative powers. As such, the JCE’s main focus remains on requiring political parties and candidates to submit reports, which are made public but not reviewed. According to JCE representatives, stronger mechanisms are needed to ensure that private donations are properly declared and traceable. As it stands, vague reporting formats and limited controls allow parties to receive funds that may go undetected.
A third key factor contributing to the transparency gap is both the weakness and the inconsistent application of sanctions. Despite several cases of suspected violations, no political party or candidate has ever been sanctioned for financial misconduct or other breaches of electoral laws, underscoring the persistent disconnect between regulation and enforcement. This is further discussed in the following Section 9.3.2.
In response to these persistent gaps, the JCE has taken steps to strengthen transparency and oversight by upgrading its online portal for publishing political finance reports and developing new software to further easing the reporting process through the digital auditing platform. In parallel, the JCE has organised workshops and training sessions aimed at improving compliance by political organisations with their financial disclosure obligations and promoting more effective use of the digital reporting tools provided by the electoral authority (OAS, 2024[15]). JCE representatives confirmed that its Specialised Higher Institute for Political, Electoral and Civil Registry Information (Instituto Especializado Superior de Información Política Electoral y del Estado Civil) is actively engaged in providing internal training for staff and capacity-building programmes for the Electoral Board, political parties, and civil society. These training initiatives cover a wide range of topics, including electoral quality, quality management, information security, and business continuity management.
While these efforts are notable, further legal reforms are needed to address long-standing weaknesses in electoral oversight and campaign finance. In particular, the financial disclosure provisions in Law No. 33-2018 and Organic Law No. 20-2023 could be made more precise to improve the consistency and completeness of party reports. The law could clearly define reporting requirements, requiring political parties to provide detailed, itemised financial information, clearly distinguishing between public and private sources of funding and specifying how funds are allocated and spent. Receipts could be mandatory for every private donation, with full disclosure of in-kind contributions and paid services, and reports could list each contributor and the amount given. Parties could also be explicitly required to maintain separate bank accounts for public and private funds. The legal framework could also require that all contributions be made through traceable bank transactions. Cash donations could be limited to very small amounts, such as those from grassroots fundraising, to reduce the risk of illicit funds entering political campaigns.
The law could also make it mandatory to use the JCE’s standardised reporting templates and software, with sanctions for non-compliance. Standardised digital formats for income and expenditure reporting should be compulsory for all parties and candidates, accompanied by detailed protocols for recording contributions, tracking sources, and documenting expenditures. The system should allow automated publication of reports and enable inter-institutional data exchange with tax authorities, banks, financial intelligence units, and public finance bodies to verify invoices and ensure compliance with tax rules. This would help prevent the submission of fake invoices or the artificial reduction of reported costs to meet spending limits.
Further guidance is also needed regarding Article 222’s requirement that reports “detail the management, administration, and accounting of the funds received, using the indicators and audit standards established by the Chamber of Accounts”. In this regard, the Chamber of Accounts indicated that, at the time of writing of this report, it was in the process of developing specific standards, guidelines and procedures for the auditing and financial reporting of non-governmental entities, including political parties, with the objective of strengthening control mechanisms, transparency and accountability in this area.
Lastly, the JCE could also be equipped with stronger auditing capacities to take a more proactive role in verifying and auditing financial reports, since the Chamber of Accounts no longer audits party finances. According to JCE representatives, the institution needs to build its capacity to conduct substantive audits or partner with independent public auditors to compare party accounts against actual activities. According to the JCE, the Specialised Directorate for Financial Oversight of Political Parties, Groups, and Movements remains understaffed to review thousands of reports submitted by party candidates. Employing certified auditors, as done in 44% of OECD countries (Figure 9.3, Box 9.1), would also allow more effective detection of irregularities and reduce susceptibility to outside influence, as auditors are then also subject to the regulatory safeguards underpinning the body’s independence and to the body’s standards of conduct. In addition, keeping certified auditors on the payroll can improve continuity between audits and institutional memory (OECD, 2024[26]). Alternatively, the law could require that all entities and candidates submitting annual financial reports to the JCE first have their accounts audited by a certified auditor (Box 9.2). Strengthening audit capacity would also enable the JCE to conduct targeted audits of campaign spending to detect practices that may signal vote-buying. Indeed, this practice typically involves the purchase and distribution of goods, such as food and basic supplies, during campaigns. Such expenditures, particularly when unusually large or poorly justified, may signal illicit intent and should trigger enhanced scrutiny. As recommended in Section 9.3.3, such audits could include reviewing expenditures linked to the distribution of large quantities of goods (such as rice, bread, oil, milk, oats, or cement) and auditing the conditions and timing of their distribution to voters.
Note: Data for 2025, or earliest available data. The US Federal Election Commission is the supervisory body for political financing and election campaigns. However, because legislation does not define dismissal procedures for the head of managing body of the authority, the FEC does not fulfil the requirement on independence in the criterion ‘An independent body has the mandate to oversee the financing of political parties and election campaigns’. The FEC does have certified auditors on its payroll. Data not provided by Japan and Switzerland.
Source: (OECD, 2026[13])
Norway
In Norway, the Partilovnemnda (the Party Law Committee) is an independent administrative body responsible for, among other things, checking that the funding provisions in the Parties Act are complied with. The Party Law Committee may demand that a party or a party branch present all documentation of importance for checking compliance with financial duties within the Act. If the Committee deems it necessary, it may order control activities to be carried out by a specially appointed control body, the Party Audit Committee. The Party Audit Committee can demand that the party or party branch present any documentation to support the control activity. To ensure the effectiveness of this audit work, the Party Law Committee employs auditors as part of its Partirevisjonsutvalget (Committee for the Revision of Parties).
Canada
In Canada, the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada is the institution responsible for overseeing political financing of political parties and election campaigns. Based in the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada is responsible for electoral administration and political financing oversight, according to the powers it receives from the Canada Elections Act. To ensure specialised expertise of personnel and methodologies to discover illegal funding of political parties and candidates, Elections Canada’s Political Financing branch employs auditors in the course of its activities.
Source: Based on (OECD, 2024[27]), OECD Public Integrity Indicators Database, https://data-explorer.oecd.org
France
In France, political parties must have their accounts certified by a statutory auditor before submitting them to the National Commission for Campaign Accounts and Political Financing (CNCCFP). As an administrative authority, the CNCCFP does not re-audit the financial statements; its role is to verify compliance with legal requirements (submission, certification, completeness of documentation, consistency, etc.).
Germany
In Germany, parties prepare an annual Rechenschaftsbericht (financial report), which is approved by the party’s executive board and signed by the financial officers. This report must be audited by a certified public accounting firm (Wirtschaftsprüfer). Once audited, it is submitted to the President of the Bundestag within the prescribed deadlines. The President reviews the file and may, in case of doubt, request additional information or commission a further audit through a designated auditor.
European Union
European political parties must have their annual financial statements (balance sheet, income statement, and annexes) audited by an independent auditor appointed by the European Parliament or the Authority for European Political Parties and Foundations (APPF). The APPF, as an independent authority, verifies that the financial and audit reports have been properly submitted, checks the consistency of the declarations, and can impose financial sanctions of up to 300% of undeclared amounts, or even deregister parties. The APPF cannot audit the accounts itself, as this falls outside its regulatory mandate and technical expertise.
Source: Research by the OECD Secretariat
9.3.2. To close enforcement gaps in political finance regulation, the catalogue of electoral offences and corresponding sanctions could be expanded
Effective enforcement of political finance regulations requires two complementary components: first, violations must be effectively detected; second, detected breaches must be met with proportionate, timely and dissuasive sanctions. Disclosure requirements and oversight mechanisms can therefore only achieve their intended purpose when supported by proportionate, timely and dissuasive sanctions. Without meaningful enforcement, even well-designed transparency systems risk becoming largely symbolic, undermining public trust and creating opportunities for undue influence, illicit financing and the circumvention of electoral rules (OECD, 2017[2]).
Under the current legal framework, the electoral enforcement regime comprises administrative electoral infractions, electoral offences and electoral crimes. The Central Electoral Board (JCE) is responsible for investigating and sanctioning administrative electoral infractions established under Articles 305-308 of Organic Law No. 20-2023 on the Electoral Regime. Electoral offences and crimes established under Articles 309-320 of Law No. 20-2023, as well as sanctions provided for under Law No. 33-2018 on Political Parties, fall within the jurisdiction of the ordinary criminal courts and are prosecuted by the Procuraduría Especializada para la Investigación y Persecución de los Crímenes y Delitos Electorales (PECDE). These include, inter alia, vote buying, electoral fraud, coercion of voters, misuse of public resources and campaign finance violations giving rise to criminal liability. Following Constitutional Court Judgment TC/0508/21 and the adoption of Law No. 20-2023, these offences fall within the jurisdiction of the ordinary criminal courts.
The JCE’s administrative enforcement powers have been strengthened through the adoption of a dedicated regulation establishing formal procedures for the investigation, processing and sanctioning of administrative electoral infractions (Junta Central Electoral, n.d.[28]). These functions are carried out by the Specialised Unit for Attention, Monitoring and Enforcement Mechanisms for Sanctions related to Electoral Administrative Offences and Precautionary Measures (Unidad de Atención, Seguimiento y Mecanismos de Ejecución de las Sanciones con Ocasión de las Infracciones Administrativas Electorales y Medidas Cautelares), operating within the JCE. This institutional mechanism was created to enforce the provisions of Law No. 20-2023 on the Electoral Regime, with the aim of addressing electoral infractions in a transparent, efficient, and timely manner. In line with the offenses established in Article 308 of Law No. 20-2023, the regulation defines a range of administrative violations, including premature campaigning, illegal political propaganda, misuse of state resources in campaigns, obstruction of electoral processes, breaches of financial reporting obligations, violations of gender quota rules, and non-compliance with campaign spending limits. Investigations may be initiated by the JCE either ex officio, or in response to complaints submitted by citizens, institutions, or reports from electoral observers. To address identified violations, the regulation enables the JCE to impose a range of administrative sanctions such as monetary fines, candidate disqualification, suspension of campaign activities, loss of public funding, official warnings, and even ineligibility for public office in severe cases.
While this framework represents an important step forward, challenges remain regarding the consistency and effectiveness of enforcement. In particular, stakeholders pointed to cases in which legal violations did not result in sanctions despite explicit provisions in the law. For example, Participación Ciudadana reported a concrete breach of Electoral Law in which most political parties began pre-campaign activities before the official start date. Although the legal framework prescribes the inadmissibility of candidacies for such violations, no sanctions were applied, nor were cases referred the courts. Participación Ciudadana criticised this inaction, warning that the lack of consequences not only undermines the rule of law but also inflates election costs and enables corruption and organised crime to infiltrate politics (Participación Ciudadana, 2023[29]). In response, the JCE adopted a series of measures aimed at clarifying and regulating the pre-campaign period, including issuing formal warnings against premature campaigning, adopting Resolution No. 28-2021 regulating pre-campaign activities, and convening a national summit with political organisations on the regulatory framework governing pre-campaign and electoral campaigns (“Cumbre sobre el marco regulatorio de la precampana y la campana electoral”).
These implementation challenges are partly linked to gaps in the current sanctions framework. The JCE indicated that several forms of conduct prohibited under electoral legislation are not accompanied by explicit sanctions, limiting the institution’s ability to apply punitive measures and leaving it primarily with preventive or corrective tools, such as the temporary retention or suspension of public funding and the issuance of formal compliance requests. For example, while Article 42 of Law No. 33-2018 establishes spending limits for pre-campaign activities at the presidential, congressional, municipal and district levels, the law does not establish explicit sanctions for exceeding these limits during the pre-campaign phase. Similarly, the JCE identified gaps regarding sanctions applicable to:
Violations of pre-campaign spending limits (Article 49, Law No. 33-2018)
The use of public resources for electoral purposes (Article 59, Law No. 33-2018)
The use of anonymous media to conduct electoral campaigns (Article 171, Law No. 20-2023), breaches of the electoral silence period (Article 179, Law No. 20-2023)
Political propaganda in public spaces and official vehicles (Article 180, Law No. 20-2023)
The promotion of candidates during public events by state entities or through the inauguration of public works (Article 209, Law No. 20-2023).
In practice, the absence of clear, proportionate and consistently applied sanctions risks weakening compliance incentives and fostering perceptions of impunity. Political actors may underreport income, exceed spending limits or rely on illicit financing if enforcement mechanisms are perceived as weak or unlikely to result in meaningful consequences. Expanding and clarifying the catalogue of electoral offences and sanctions would therefore strengthen the credibility and effectiveness of the political finance framework. This could include introducing explicit sanctions for currently uncovered violations, as well as proportionate penalties for failures to comply with reporting obligations and deadlines, such as automatic fines for late submissions.
In parallel, the JCE could further strengthen transparency and public confidence by systematically consolidating and publishing information on electoral complaints, investigations and sanctions imposed. Publishing regular statistics and enforcement data would allow stakeholders to better assess the implementation and effectiveness of electoral legislation. Continued training and awareness-raising efforts targeting political parties, candidates and electoral stakeholders would also help strengthen understanding of legal obligations, reporting requirements and the consequences of non-compliance.
9.3.3. To more effectively combat vote-buying, the legal framework could extend beyond bribery by explicitly prohibiting and sanctioning the distribution of goods, services and other incentives to voters, as well as other clientelist practices
The issue of vote-buying, which refers to the distribution of money or gifts to individuals, families or small groups in order to influence their vote choice or turnout, has been a recurring element during electoral processes in the Dominican Republic (OAS, 2024[15]; IFES, 2021[16]).
While Dominican electoral laws have included sanctions for vote-buying since 1926, the 2019 electoral reform brought significant changes to the electoral system. First, Organic Law No. 15‑2019 and its replacement Organic Law No. 20-2023 explicitly banned vote‑buying. Per Article 316, paragraph 4, voters who “directly or indirectly solicit gifts or presents in exchange for voting for any candidate or group of candidates” face a custodial sentence of 1 to 3 years of prison. In addition, paragraph 9 deals with voter bribery (“soborno”), and punishes “those who bribe, in any way and by any means, a voter to induce them to vote in a certain way”. Other legal texts also criminalise the misuse of state resources in favour of a political party or candidate, including Law No. 41-2008 on Public Service and Law No. 33-2018 on Political Parties, Groups, and Movements (Articles 25(7), 78, and 81). Second, Article 321 and 322 of the Organic Law No. 20-2023 give the Specialised Prosecutor’s Office for the Investigation and Prosecution of Electoral Crimes (Procuraduría Especializada en Crímenes y Delitos Electorales, PECDE) jurisdiction over the prosecution of electoral crimes and offences, including vote-buying.
The 2020 elections marked the first time formal charges were filed in relation to vote-buying in the Dominican Republic. Although limited in number compared to the scale of the issue, these cases represent a significant step forward in addressing the practice. During this electoral cycle, the Public Ministry received and processed the first official complaints, one of which led to a conviction (IFES, 2021[16]). Still, the PECDE has identified several structural challenges that hinder effective prosecution of electoral crimes. These include a shortage of specialised investigators with the tools and training needed for timely inquiries, and recurring delays in the transmission of evidence from certain electoral boards and bodies (IFES, 2021[16]).
In recent years, the JCE has taken proactive steps to prevent vote-buying practices, including through training programmes for electoral prosecutors, public awareness and civic education campaigns, operational protocols, and strengthened co-ordination with the Office of the Attorney General to address practices such as the buying, selling and retention of Electoral Identity Cards. As part of these efforts, Resolution No. 18-2024 “Protocol for the Security of the Chain of Custody and Electoral Premises under the Responsibility of the Electoral Military Police” established a protocol for securing polling stations and their immediate surroundings, requiring entrances and perimeters to remain clear, prohibiting political campaigning infrastructure near polling sites, and authorising the Electoral Military Police to control access and remove structures that could obstruct or influence voting. These measures aimed to dismantle fixed points traditionally associated with clientelist practices, reduce the concentration of political activists around polling sites, and limit the logistical capacity to coerce or direct voters.
Despite this notable progress in electoral regulation and implementation, vote-buying remains a persistent challenge in the Dominican Republic, posing serious risks to the freedom of the vote, the integrity of electoral outcomes, and the overall quality of democratic governance. According to the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Index, the Dominican Republic scores 1.154 out of 4 on the vote-buying indicator, suggesting a pattern of recurrent and observable (although not systematic) vote-buying efforts, which remain a routine feature of the political landscape (Figure 9.4).
Note: The V-Dem Vote Buying indicator (v2elvotbuy) measures the extent to which elections are free from vote-buying, on a scale from 0 to 4. Higher scores indicate cleaner elections with little or no vote-buying; lower scores reflect more widespread and impactful vote-buying. A score of 0 denotes vote-buying is pervasive and decisive; 1 indicates it is common and influential; 2 suggests it occurs regularly but is not decisive; 3 means it is occasional and marginal; and 4 signifies that vote-buying is virtually absent.
Source: Varieties of Democracy (V-DEM) Index, https://www.v-dem.net/
A key weakness in the legal framework lies in Article 316, paragraph 9 of Law No. 20-2023, which penalises instigators of vote-buying but defines the offence solely as “bribery” (“soborno”), using vague language such as “by any way and by any means”. This lack of precision creates ambiguity about what constitutes vote-buying. For example, campaign practices like distributing basic food packages or construction materials to voters during election campaigns, which are common in the Dominican Republic and are often reported in parties’ financial statements, blur the lines between basic food provision to vulnerable populations, political clientelism and illegal inducement. In a report recently published in June 2025, Participación Ciudanada noted that for the 2024 General Elections, campaigns invested a total of DOP 460 million solely in cash donations to households and individuals. When adding spending on food and beverages, construction materials and home repairs (blocks, cement, wood, zinc, etc.), furniture and appliances (beds, stoves, fans, etc.), and other items (school supplies, medicines, footwear, fertilisers, etc.), the organisation concluded that potential vote-buying expenses amounted to DOP 600 million (Participación Ciudanada, 2025[23]).
To address these gaps, the provision could be revised to provide a comprehensive definition of prohibited behaviours and explicitly include inducements such as the distribution of goods or services to influence voter behaviour. Alternatively, and as proposed by the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), authorities could adopt interpretive guidelines that clarify what constitutes vote-buying under the current language. A dual accountability system could be introduced to impose individual penalties on offenders while also holding their affiliated political parties subsidiarily responsible for vote-buying through institutional sanctions, as also suggested by Participación Ciudadana. Similarly, penalties should also reflect clear legal standards set by the Superior Electoral Court, balancing deterrence with fairness, ensuring that sanctions target organisers and instigators without excessively criminalising socioeconomically vulnerable individuals who may accept inducements out of necessity (IFES, 2021[16]). For political parties, sanctions could include measures ranging from the partial or full reimbursement of public electoral funding to temporary suspension or the permanent revocation of the party’s legal status.
Lastly, given its complexity, vote-buying requires a multi-pronged response. While this chapter does not aim to cover all measures, several merit considerations. First, there is a need to shift prevailing social and political attitudes that normalise vote-buying. Research shows that the practice remains widely accepted in the Dominican Republic, with some voters even auctioning their votes (Bertelsmann Stiftung, 2024[10]; Freedom House, 2024[11]; IFES, 2021[16]; OAS, 2020[20]). In line with Chapter 5's recommendations, the JCE, together with DIGEIG and relevant ministries, could integrate content on electoral rights and vote-buying into civic education and public awareness campaigns. Aligned with Chapter 7’s recommendations, the legal framework should clearly define reporting channels for vote-buying, ensuring that complaints can be securely submitted to the JCE, the Superior Electoral Court, or the PECDE. Finally, the JCE could conduct targeted audits of campaign spending focused on vote-buying indicators, as recommended in Section 9.3.1.
The political finance landscape is evolving and becoming increasingly complex. Key developments related to digitalisation and globalisation are making it more challenging for countries to manage donations to parties and candidates and to ensure that political financing continues to support representative democracies and competitive markets. In many countries, gaps in the regulation of third parties, social media campaigning, and government advertising during electoral periods have created new channels for opaque financing, circumvention of spending limits, and undue influence over voters (OECD, 2024[5]; OECD, 2026[13]).
As such, beyond the regulation of political parties and candidates, safeguarding electoral integrity increasingly requires addressing emerging risks associated with third-party campaigning and the growing use of digital platforms in political communication. In the Dominican Republic, strengthening the legal and regulatory framework in these areas could help close existing loopholes, enhance transparency and accountability, and ensure a more level playing field in electoral competition, while preserving fundamental rights and an enabling environment for civil society.
9.4.1. The Dominican Republic could consider introducing clear regulations and accounting standards for third-party campaigning
The lack of transparency around the funding sources and political activities of third parties has become a growing concern among OECD countries. Third parties refer to stakeholders and interest groups that are involved in election campaigning – acting independently of political parties – but do not formally run in elections as political parties or candidates. These may include charities, faith groups, individuals or private firms that campaign in the run-up to elections. But while their activities have the potential to affect electoral processes significantly, these actors are often subject to less stringent reporting obligations, and in many cases, are not required to disclose their funding sources (OECD, 2021[4]).
These loopholes allow donors who may be restricted in how much they can contribute directly to parties or candidates to instead channel money through third-party organisations. In some cases, foreign actors exploit these gaps, using third parties as intermediaries to covertly influence election outcomes. Additionally, these groups can engage in unregulated political advertising, including social media advocacy and public events, without facing the same transparency requirements imposed on political parties or candidates (OECD, 2021[4]).
In the Dominican Republic, the JCE noted that billboards with electoral messages funded by third parties are common, yet it is often unclear whether they are actually commissioned and paid for by political parties, who typically omit them from their financial reports, or by genuinely independent third parties. This ambiguity enables candidates to disclaim any knowledge of their origin. The legal framework also remains vague on the issue of third-party political spending and there is currently no explicit regulation on third-party involvement in political campaigns. As such, Laws No. 33-2018 and 20-2023 could be amended to introduce clear definitions and rules governing the funding and political activities of independent fundraising organisations acting as third parties during an election.
An increasing number of OECD countries are adopting stricter regulations on third-party political activities, emphasising transparency in expenditures and donor identities, especially during election periods. Table 9.5 presents examples that may serve as a reference framework for the Dominican Republic. That said, as highlighted in Chapter 8, ensuring a safe and enabling environment for civil society is a prerequisite to imposing robust disclosure requirements on civil society organisations and other groups regarding their funding sources and activities aimed at influencing elections.
9.4.2. The Dominican Republic could strengthen rules governing the use of social media and political advertising for electoral purposes
Going further, in today's context, it is also essential to monitor closely the way in which political parties use data and digital platforms to influence voters. Whereas electoral campaigns naturally involve the collection of voters’ opinions and political advertising, how and the extent to which this is being done has dramatically changed. Recent evidence shows that spending on online political advertisements has increased significantly in recent years (OECD, 2021[4]), including in the Dominican Republic, where paid political advertisements can regularly be seen on social media during and outside election periods.
Political and electoral campaigners are also increasingly using digital tools and social media to enhance the reach and sophistication of their fundraising efforts. While these approaches can improve efficiency, by lowering costs compared to traditional media and enabling highly targeted messaging through microtargeting, they also introduce new integrity risks. The use of artificial intelligence and big data analytics further amplifies these effects by allowing campaigners to rapidly generate tailored fundraising content based on predictive analysis of donors’ locations, demographics, interests, or past behaviour (Muzergues, 2024[31]; Hamada and Agrawal, 2025[32]; IDEA, 2025[33]). At the same time, online fundraising can obscure the true source and intermediaries of political donations, including through payment platforms, fundraising services, or small, repeated contributions that are difficult to trace, increasing vulnerability to exploitation by illicit or foreign actors seeking to circumvent donation rules.
In parallel, political parties and candidates are increasingly relying on social media influencers to reach voters, particularly younger audiences for whom social media is a primary source of political information. While influencers can help broaden outreach and communicate messages in accessible formats, their growing role raises transparency concerns. In many jurisdictions, campaign finance and political advertising rules do not require the disclosure of paid relationships with influencers, nor of related expenditures. As a result, influencer content may fall into regulatory grey areas, where it is unclear whether it should be considered personal expression, which would be protected by freedom of expression guarantees, or sponsored political communication or in-kind political donations (Hamada and Agrawal, 2025[32]).
The JCE acknowledged facing significant challenges in curbing informal campaigning due to legal loopholes, particularly in the context of rapidly evolving online information spaces. Results from the OECD Survey on Drivers of Trust in Public Institutions in Latin America and the Caribbean show that people in the LAC region have media consumption patterns for political and current affairs that differ from those observed across the OECD, with a particularly strong reliance on social media. Overall, 72% of respondents across LAC countries and 76% of respondents in the Dominican Republic, the second-highest share in the region, report using social media regularly to access information on politics and current affairs, compared to 49% across the OECD. Respondents in the Dominican Republic also reported the highest reliance on social media as a source of political and current affairs information in the region: on average, they estimated that 62% of the information they receive on these topics comes from social media, compared to 55% across LAC countries and 34% across the OECD. A notable feature of media consumption patterns in the LAC region, and particularly in the Dominican Republic, is that the use of social media for political and current affairs information is widespread across all age groups, not only among younger citizens. In the Dominican Republic, 73% of respondents aged 18-29, 78% of those aged 30-49, and 76% of those aged 50 and over report using social media regularly to access information on politics and current affairs (OECD, 2025[34]).
Social media platforms present distinct regulatory challenges, even though online advertising is legally classified as “propaganda” in the Dominican Republic and must be reported as part of campaign spending. In practice, distinguishing between different types of content, such as paid advertisements or in-kind donations, or the amount spent, makes it difficult to assess how existing rules apply. The legal framework, along with any implementing regulations and guidelines adopted by the JCE, could explicitly state that such expenditures are subject to the same spending limits and caps on private contributions as all other campaign expenses.
Moreover, beyond paid political advertising, the costs associated with producing and disseminating campaign content on social media, including staff time, consultants, content creation and digital campaign services, could also be reportable as political expenditures, regardless of whether the content is distributed through paid advertising or organic posts. Several OECD countries require such to be reported as campaign expenses, including Canada (Box 9.3). An important distinction is that such requirements do not mean parties or candidates have report each individual organic social media post. Rather, the focus is on the costs incurred to produce and disseminate campaign communications, including staff time, consultants, content creation, graphic design, video production, digital strategy and other related services. This approach recognises that organic social media campaigns can involve significant financial and human resources even where no advertising space is purchased.
The Canada Elections Act distinguishes between election advertising (during the election period) and partisan advertising (during the pre-election period), both of which include advertising messages transmitted by any means that promote or oppose political parties, candidates or associated political issues. Elections Canada's Interpretation Note 2020-05 clarifies that these definitions apply equally to digital communications. However, content published free of charge on a political entity's own website or social media account is generally not considered election or partisan advertising because no placement cost is incurred.
This distinction does not exempt digital communications from campaign finance reporting. The Canada Elections Act adopts a broad definition of election expenses, encompassing any costs incurred for property or services used to directly promote or oppose a political party or candidate. Under section 376, reportable expenses include the production and dissemination of campaign material “in any media or by any other means”, as well as remuneration and expenses paid to individuals providing campaign services. Accordingly, although unpaid social media posts are generally not regulated as election advertising, the costs associated with producing and disseminating digital campaign content, including staff, consultants, graphic design, video production, digital strategy, website development and other campaign services, remain reportable as election expenses.
Elections Canada also provides specific guidance on the use of social media influencers. Paid influencer posts made on behalf of a political entity constitute election or partisan advertising and must comply with the requirements of the Canada Elections Act, including displaying the political entity's authorisation statement (“tagline”). By contrast, individuals expressing political views independently and without compensation from a political entity are engaging in personal political expression rather than regulated political advertising.
Source: Canada Elections Act (S.C. 2000, c. 9), https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/e-2.01/; Elections Canada (2020), Interpretation Note: 2020-05 (November 2020), https://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=res&dir=gui/app/2020-05&document=index&lang=e
Lastly, stakeholders interviewed for this report noted that government advertising campaigns with no purpose other than promoting ruling party pre-candidates or candidates are common. Participación Ciudadana reported that in early 2024, the executive branch spent over six times more on advertising than in the same period the previous year (Participación Ciudanada, 2025[23]). Article 210 of Law No. 20-2023 prohibits State advertising during the campaign from containing elements that directly or indirectly promote voting for any candidate; however, paragraph II of the same article exempts social assistance, community aid, and regular public service programmes from this ban. The OAS Mission observed such advertising, particularly by government ministries, in the days before the 2024 election (OAS, 2024[15]).
This highlights the need for clearer rules on the dissemination of government achievements and public works during the electoral period. In other countries, official communications are prohibited from the moment the electoral process is formally announced, with exceptions only for essential public service messages (e.g. vaccination campaigns, disaster alerts). Some jurisdictions also forbid including specific voices, names, or images in such messages, ensuring they are disseminated without association to political parties, governments, or public officials. Applying similar restrictions to both national and local media in the Dominican Republic would help uphold the constitutional principle of equity for opposition candidates and parties.
Establishing fair and transparent rules for public and private funding of political parties and candidates
The allocation of public funding to political parties could be improved by establishing more proportional eligibility criteria in Law No. 33-2018.
To better frame private funding and promote a balanced funding model between public and private sources, individual private donations could be capped at a fixed amount.
Strengthening reporting, transparency and enforcement in political party financing
To improve the consistency and completeness of the financial reports submitted by political parties, Law No. 33-2018 and Organic Law No. 20-2023 could be amended to include more specific criteria and enhanced auditing processes.
To close enforcement gaps in political finance regulation, the catalogue of electoral offences and corresponding sanctions could be expanded.
To more effectively combat vote-buying, the legal framework could extend beyond bribery by explicitly prohibiting and sanctioning the distribution of goods, services and other incentives to voters, as well as other clientelist practices.
Addressing transparency gaps in third-party, online and digitally enabled electoral campaigning
The Dominican Republic could consider introducing clear regulations and accounting standards for third-party campaigning.
The Dominican Republic could strengthen rules governing the use of social media and political advertising for electoral purposes.
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