Jordan

Elections

Electoral laws

After a period of 22 years, in 1989 the first elections were held in Jordan under King Hussein’s rule. The official ban on political parties from 1957 remained, but candidates ranged ideologically from the extreme left to the extreme right. Most of these independent candidates formed loosely organized blocs. Analysts state that these blocs were predominantly organized along tribal and family ties, instead of along political or ideological affiliations. Nevertheless, Islamists won 22 out of 80 parliamentary seats in the 1989 elections, a fact that motivated the King to initiate a policy of electoral de-liberalization with the aim of decreasing the influence of Islamists on Jordan’s politics. Thus, a new 2001 Election Law introduced a controversial ‘one man, one vote’ electoral system, known as ‘single non-transferable vote system’. This system envisaged the redistribution of parliamentary seats, meaning that citizens vote for one candidate in their own district, with seats being awarded to the highest-polling individual candidates compatible with the number of seats in the district.

In 2010, a new temporary electoral law was unveiled, designed to set the ground rules for the 2010 parliamentary elections. It preserved the ‘single non-transferable vote system’ and also changed the current electoral districts to electoral "zones", each of which is broken down into multiple sub-districts. 

After heated debates in the parliament, on 22 June 2012, the first permanent election law since 1989 was approved by a Royal Decree. Each voter was given two votes, one for a candidate at the district level and another for the closed proportional list. Compared to the former ‘single non-transferrable vote system’, this system created a new electoral culture because each voter was able to pick a list of five candidates in his or her constituency. 

2016 Election Law 

During the run up towards the 2016 parliamentary elections, a new Election Law was introduced. The controversial one-person-one-vote system was replaced with a list-based system designed to encourage political parties. Another new aspect in the law is that registration for the elections is not optional. Therefore, the number of eligible voters rose to 4,130,142 from 2,288,043 in the 2013 elections. In addition, the introduction of the Election Law saw a reduction in the number of seats in the Lower House from 150 to 130, while the women's quato remained at 15. The 2016 Election Law has been criticized for leaving intact a voting system that favors sparsely populated tribal East Bank constituencies over the densely populated cities mostly inhabited by Jordanians of Palestinian descent, which are Islamic strongholds and highly politicized. For example, in one constituency in the city of Zarqa, 450,000 eligible voters who usually back Islamists have only six parliamentary seats. By contrast, in the southern tribal town of Maan, 59,000 voters choose four members of parliament. More than two-thirds of Jordan’s seven million people live in cities but are allocated less than a third of assembly seats.

Parliamentary elections

On 20 October 2016, parliamentary elections were held in Jordan. The candidates stood mostly as independents, their loyalties rooted not in political parties but in tribal and family allegiances. Results showed the main opposition party, the Islamic Action Front based National Coalition for Reform, gained 15 seats. Eight other poltical parties won 15 seats including the Islamist party Zamzam (five seats), the National Current Party (four seats), the Islamic Centrist Party (five seats) and the Justice and Reform Party (two seats). The Baath, Communist, National Union and Al Awn parties wone one seat each. However, the majority of the newly elected MPs were either individuals with tribal affiliations or businessmen, as had been the case during the past two decades. The percentage of government critics in this parliament is lower than in the previous. The voter turnout was 36,1%. The voting was observed by thousands of local and international observers. The Independent Elections Commission (IEC), created under the Electoral Law in 2012, was appointed to observe and supervise the parliamentary elections for the second time, in order to guarantee free and transparent elections.

Turnout and voting process

Observers stated that the turnout for these parliamentary elections was 37 percent at the national level, with Amman recording the lowest at around 23 percent and the Southern Badia the highest at around 84 percent. This was considerably lower than the previous elections in 2013. This could be explained by the fact that registration for the elections is not optional anymore. Therefore, the number of eligible voters rose to 4,130,142 from 2,288,043 in the 2013 elections. Observers from the European Union Election Observation Mission (EU EOM) said it was a well administrated election, although room for additional improvement of the legal framework remains. In particular, respect for key principles, such as the universality and equality of the vote, and the right to stand as candidate could be further enhanced. Furthermore, under the current districting, large urban areas are underrepresented and sparsely populated or rural areas are considered overrepresented. Overall, the campaign was peaceful, with isolated reports of minor campaign related incidents. There was considerable campaigning outside the polling stations on the election day, which is not in line with the law. Opening and counting proceeded peacefully and calmly and voting was generally well organized in 441 out 459 polling stations visited. Although no specific restrictions on electoral media coverage were observed, Jordanian media operated in an environment considered as partially free. The current media legal framework, restrictive and at times vague, results in self-censorship.

Opposition parties

New during this elections was the participation of the Islamic Action Front (IAF), the political arm of Jordan’s Muslim Brotherhood, and Jordan’s main political opposition. It boycotted the last two elections to protest the previous election laws. This year, it decided to participate in the election, because of the introduction of the party lists. It formed 20 lists running under Al Islah bloc, or the National Coalition of Reform, which includes Christian members of other political parties and tribal leaders. The IAF managed to get 15 seats in the newly elected parliament, though it is unlikely that representation of the IAF is going to cause any dramatic change in the country’s political atmosphere. The comeback of Jordan’s best organized opposition has left secular rivals fearing the revival of Islamism in a contest where national politics has taken a back seat. They have responded by demanding the separation of politics and religion and attacking political Islam.

Representation of women and minorities

20 women won seats in the parliament. Of these woman, 15 won a seat because of the state-set quota for women. The other women won their seat by defeating their male candidates. The Christian minority have 9 state-set seats, while there are 3 seats reserved for the Circassian and Chechen communities.

Sources

General information

• BBC Country profile
• CIA World Factbook
• Arab Net
• UNDP
• World Bank 
• Carnegie Endowment

Elections

• Electionguide.org
• United Nations DP
• MEDEA
• Jordan Independent Election Commission

Politics

• European Union Official Website
• National Democratic Institute (NDI)
• Arab Decision
• Freedom House 
• EU External Relations 
• King Hussein
• BBC Profile King Adullah 
• National Charter 1990
• Dealing with Jihadi Islamism (ICG)
• Jordan Politics
• Website of King Abdullah II
• The National

Media

• Jordan Times
• Al-jazeera
• Reuters
• BBC News
• MENAFN
• Ammon News
• GulfNews
• Jordanian Politics
• Jordan Senate
• King Abdullah's official site

Literature

• Boers, Carlein. ‘Democratization in the Middle East: The case of Jordan.’ University of Amsterdam (2005)
• Hinnebusch, Raymond. ‘Globalization, State Formation and Generational Change: Foreing policy in Syria and Jordan.’ Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, No. 19 (2003)
• Jolen, Judith. ‘The Quest for Legitimacy: The role of Islam in the state’s political discourse in Egypt and Jordan, 1979-1996’. K.U.N (2003)
• Salibi, Kamal. ‘The Modern History of Jordan.’ I.B. Tauris & Co Ltd (1993)
• Shami, Taminian, Morsy et al. ‘Women in Arab Society: Work patterns and gender relations in Egypt, Jordan and Sudan.’ UNESCO (1990)
• Sweiss, Shtweiwi, al-Attiyat. ‘Building Democracy in Jordan: Women’s political participation, political party life and democratic elections.’ IDEA and ANND (2005)