Philippa Neave: The unexpected challenges of a country's first election
Philippa Neave: Le sfide inaspettate nei paesi alle prime elezioni.
Philippa Neave is senior advisor on the UN's Lexicon of Electoral Terminology. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
there's no word for it,
allora non avrà nome.
we know what we're talking about.
sappiamo di cosa stiamo parlando.
We have the vocabulary.
Abbiamo la terminologia.
where democracy doesn't exist,
dove la democrazia non esiste,
no words to describe the concepts
per esprimere i concetti
di una società democratica?
of electoral assistance,
dell'assistenza elettorale,
who goes around the world
che vanno in giro per il mondo
on countries that can't handle it."
in paesi che non sanno gestirla".
does not impose anything on anybody.
proprio niente.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights,
dei diritti umani del 1948,
nell'Articolo 21,
to choose who governs them.
di scegliere il proprio governo.
è la sensibilizzazione dei cittadini.
È un altro termine tecnico.
designing information campaigns
campagne d'informazione
to participate or to vote
né candidarsi né votare
campaign to reach out to women
indirizzata unicamente alle donne
because very often in this work,
In questo lavoro, molto spesso,
that I've been doing it
high levels of illiteracy,
di analfabetismo.
it was in 2005,
on the same day.
due elezioni nello stesso giorno.
are so incredibly difficult,
coordinare il tutto
la soluzione migliore.
explaining two elections instead of one
alla popolazione
di progettare la scheda
so many people wanted to take part,
perché il numero di candidati era alto.
which is the parliamentary elections.
chiamate Wolesi Jirga.
we had even more candidates.
ce n'erano ancora di più:
per il Wolesi Jirga...
per il Consiglio provinciale.
a lot of symbols and things like that.
molti simboli e cose del genere.
in Southern Sudan.
abbiamo avuto altri problemi.
who had never, of course, voted,
non avevano mai votato.
high levels of illiteracy,
erano molto elevati,
the size of Texas, more or less.
abbia le stesse dimensioni del Texas,
di strade asfaltate.
where we landed the planes
di materiale elettorale e non solo
about what a box looked like.
di che aspetto avesse un'urna elettorale.
was obviously the way to go,
era usare la comunicazione verbale.
by that enormous movement
generato da quest'enorme movimento
there was Egypt, there was Yemen.
dello Yemen.
historical moment.
anzi, importantissimo.
with the election commission,
seduta con la commissione elettorale
about various aspects of the election,
di quelle elezioni,
that I hadn't actually heard before,
che io non avevo mai sentito prima,
I'd worked with Jordanians, Egyptians,
con giordani, con egiziani.
was this word "observer."
con la parola "osservatore".
was talking about "mulahiz" in Arabic.
usava la parola araba "mulahiz".
in a passive sort of sense,
e ha un'accezione passiva,
he was wearing a light blue shirt."
una camicia azzurra".
the shirt was light blue or not?
che la camicia fosse davvero azzurra?
by all kinds of treaties,
regolato da diversi trattati.
that control function in it.
of the fact that in Egypt,
che in Egitto, invece,
which means "to follow."
che significa "seguire".
followers of an election.
"seguito" le elezioni.
that's already accepted and in use,
già in uso
which means "a controller."
che significa "supervisore"
for one concept. This is not good.
per un solo concetto. Era un problema.
we thought perhaps it's our role
abbiamo pensato che stava a noi
that the words are understood
of Electoral Terminology,"
di terminologia elettorale".
in eight different countries.
in definire 481 parole
of everything you need to know
a comprendere i concetti fondamentali
a democratic election.
delle elezioni democratiche.
about what would be the appropriate word
sulla parola più appropriata
and that's part of the problem.
ed era questo, in parte, il problema.
that speak Arabic,
è l'arabo moderno standard,
that is used across the whole region
to the next in day to day language and use
ha una lingua di uso comune
colloquialismi, ecc.
added layer of complication.
fully ripe, if you like,
diciamo.
new expressions.
di nuove espressioni.
eight correspondents in the region.
i nostri otto collaboratori nella regione.
nel nostro paese".
to harmonize or force harmonization.
la lingua, né imporre questo processo.
understanding among people.
la comprensione per tutti.
the different expressions in use
it took three years to produce this
tre anni per terminarlo:
and took it actually into the field,
e l'abbiamo testata sul campo,
in all these different countries,
elettorali di tutti i paesi,
corretto e ricorretto la bozza,
in November 2014 in Cairo.
a novembre del 2014 a Il Cairo.
We published 10,000 copies.
con 10.000 copie pubblicate.
off the internet in PDF form.
da internet in formato PDF.
that they've taken it up in Somalia.
che lo diffonderanno anche in Somalia.
a version of this in Somalia,
for Electoral Management Bodies,
di gestione delle procedure elettorali
le elezioni nella regione,
built up a pan-Arab observation unit,
di osservazione del mondo panarabo
is quite high-pitched.
è di un livello abbastanza alto.
are quite technical,
need to know at least a third of it.
non serve alla popolazione media.
of what we know as civic education.
di quella che per noi è educazione civica.
in that part of the world,
the right of everybody
di tutti gli esseri umani
producing a work of reference
a del materiale di riferimento
grazie ad app per il telefono,
that can be used now
alle popolazioni,
nella loro lingua.
about the Middle East.
We hear terrorism.
Ci parlano del terrorismo.
and all this horrible negative news
e di tutte le altre cose negative,
the people, the everyday people, thinking?
delle persone, della gente comune.
let's give them the words.
diamo loro le parole.
sta in silenzio
with the knowledge tools
gli strumenti per imparare,
does not need to be silent.
non deve restare in silenzio.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Philippa Neave - Electoral consultantPhilippa Neave is senior advisor on the UN's Lexicon of Electoral Terminology.
Why you should listen
Philippa Neave specializes in electoral communications and education, devising information and training campaigns for voters and candidates in emerging democracies. Since 2005 she has worked in electoral assistance as a consultant for the United Nations, developing strategies to inform people on their voting rights, with particular emphasis on reaching women and people with low levels of literacy. She has worked on elections in Afghanistan, Iraq UAE, Jordan, Turkey, Cambodia, Madagascar, Southern Sudan and Tunisia.
An Arabic speaker, Neave initiated and conducted a three-year project to produce the first Arabic lexicon of electoral terminology. With close to 500 entries, the tri-lingual (Arabic, English and French) lexicon provides clear and accurate explanations of key concepts and terms in the field of elections. Neave's approach included a groundbreaking effort to account for Arabic language variations across the region in eight participating countries: Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine, Tunisia and Yemen.
Neave has always worked with words. For 15 years she was a reporter specialising in the Middle East. After a year and a half in Cairo, she became a foreign correspondent for an international features syndicate in based Rome, Paris and New York. Later, in London, she was chief editor of a magazine on arts and culture and in Paris after that, she was chief editor of European Press Network. She then left the news business and worked as Middle East Director for a British charity, based in Beirut for five years.
Her interest in democracy building goes back to the time when soon after leaving university, she served for several years as deputy Secretary General of the Parliamentary Association for Euro-Arab Cooperation, organising and participating in the Euro-Arab Parliamentary Dialogue.
Born in 1960 in France to an English father and a Danish mother, Neave grew up bilingual. She studied Arabic at Durham University in the UK and obtained a BA degree. She speaks seven languages, including Arabic, and is based in Paris.
Philippa Neave | Speaker | TED.com