The objective of this article is to analyze invalid votes under compulsory voting in Peru. I analyzed three Peruvian presidential elections (held in 2006, 2011, and 2016). I investigated the results of these elections at the municipal level, examining the first and second rounds separately. Thus, I created an original dataset that includes 5,478 cases from each round. I used the ordinary least squares (OLS) regression models to test theories related to invalid votes. First, I found that the higher the level of development in municipalities, the lower the number of invalid votes in municipalities. Second, I examined a feature of runoff voting and found that the higher the share of votes for eliminated candidates in the first round, the greater the number of invalid votes in the second round. These results suggest that invalid voting is linked to socioeconomic grievances and that electoral abstention under non-compulsory voting transforms into invalid votes in the second round under compulsory voting when voters’ choices are limited. These findings contribute to the current research on invalid voting, electoral systems, and electoral behavior in Peruvian municipalities.

In this article we discuss multi-level career paths of Czech politicians from 2000 to 2017. First, we describe typical career movements between policy levels, differentiating between ascending and descending paths. Subsequently, we focus on ascending paths targeting at the national level which are the most common way how to enter the Parliament. Using a complex interlinked database of candidates in individual local, regional and national elections, we find that the Czech political system is dominated by ascending career paths. One of their important effects is increasing underrepresentation of women at the national policy level.

The article analyses the Czech Republic‘s ability to promote its interests in international organizations (IOs) through its citizens‘ personnel representation. It defines two levels of such ability. First, the selection and preparation, coordination, and use of a state‘s human capital in the IOs. Second, agenda-setting, the presence of a „national perspective“ in the IOs, and the adoption of common objectives of the IOs. The analysis is primarily based on the 46 semi-structured interviews with Czech citizens, current and past employees in selected IOs (European Defence Agency, OSCE, NATO, Council of Europe, International Organization for Migration, OECD) conducted between the years of 2018 and 2019. The Czech case analysis identified several shortcomings in the setting, coordination, and the use of the personnel policy. It confirmed the role of the personnel policy on the state‘s ability to promote its interests in the IOs and showed that success in promoting the interests of the state does not depend so much on the „volume,“ but instead on the „quality“ of personnel representation, and the ability of the state personnel policy to use its citizens in the IOs to achieve its goals.