Acknowledgements A great number of organizations and individuals have contributed to this work. Without the able hands of the management team, Paul Guerin, Adhy Aman, Shana Kaiser and Rushdi Nackerdien, this Handbook would not have been produced. In addition to the lead writer, editors and contributors we would like to extend our warmest appreciation to the expert group who contributed to the development of the publication: Diane Acha-Morfaw, Raúl Avila, Zsolt Bártfai, Francesca Binda, Krystian Complak, Peta Dawson, Manohar Singh Gill, Peter Harris, Jau-Yuan Hwang, Serguei Kouznetsov, Vishakan Krishnadasan, Ralf Lindner, Ismail Mohamed, Isabelle Ribot, Ali Sawi, Kate Sullivan, José Thompson, Saumura Tioulong, Domenico Tuccinardi and Yuri Zuckermann. Many experts also went the extra mile in contributing to the improvement of the publication and added great depth through their expertise and personal experience, including Ayman Ayoub, Andrew Ellis, Maarten Halff, Joram Rukambe and Gilles Saphy. Special thanks go to our language editor Andrew Mash and copy editor Eve Johansson as well as the translator Charlie Roberts for their excellent work. The research and support team – Melanie Allen, Erika Beckman, Virginia Beramendi, Ingrid Bäckström-Vose, Luca Di Ruggiero, Henrik Domingo, Maria Gratschew, Erik Grunde, Mélida Jiménez, Stina Larserud, Nadim Mar’I, Maiko Shimizu and Sara Staino – have tirelessly supported the management team in making this Handbook more valuable to its readers. Our gratitude also goes to Antonio Spinelli for his advice and support. We also acknowledge with gratitude the valuable contribution of the numerous electoral management bodies worldwide that took the time to answer our surveys and contribute to the online database created as an extension of this Handbook, and the ACE Regional Centres which have worked with International IDEA in gathering the comparative country information: Association of Central and Eastern European Election Officials (ACEEEO), Hungary Centre for Electoral Reform (CETRO), Indonesia Commission Electorale Indépendante (CENI), Democratic Republic of the Congo Electoral Institute for the Sustainability of Democracy in Africa (EISA), South Africa Institute for Education in Democracy (IED), Kenya VII