A high voter turnout indicates a high degree of participation in political processes. Although most countries consider voting a right attached to citizenship and thus have non-compulsory voting, other countries have established compulsory voting (IDEA, 2024[1]). In the Asia/Pacific region, this is still the case today in Australia, Samoa, Singapore and Thailand.
Voter turnout rates vary hugely across the Asia/Pacific region (Figure 7.13). In the last parliamentary elections, over eight in every ten people of voting age turned out to vote in Lao PDR, Papua New Guinea, Timor-Leste and Viet Nam. In Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Pakistan less than one in every two people of voting age did so, the lowest turnouts in the Asia/Pacific region. Except for Singapore, all countries with compulsory voting have turnouts above the Asia/Pacific average.
On average, while the Asia/Pacific region has higher voting age population turnouts than OECD countries, voter turnout has remained relatively stable in both the OECD and Asia/Pacific (Figure 7.13). Azerbaijan, Nepal and Uzbekistan have experienced the sharpest declines in voter turnout since 2000 at more than 20 percentage points. In contrast, voter participation increased by around 30 percentage points in Singapore and Turkmenistan.
Confidence in the electoral process is essential for civic participation. Trust in the honesty of elections increased in most countries across the Asia/Pacific region (Figure 7.14). Confidence in fair elections increased most in Armenia, India and Nepal by more than 20 percentage points, while the largest decline in trust in the election process was observed in Lao PDR by 10 percentage points.
Across the Asia/Pacific region, people in countries with higher trust in elections also tend to have greater confidence in the national government (Figure 7.15). However, high trust in elections doesn’t always align with confidence in government. More than 84% of Azerbaijanis trust their government, but only half trust elections. In New Zealand, 80% trust elections, but only half trust their government.
