#spoil the ballot campaign
We were tasked with the challenge of identifying a social or personal problem and applying our skills, solve it using the design thinking process.
The problem:
There’s a high percentage of people that don’t vote in South Africa.
How might I:
encourage the youth of South Africa between the ages of 18-29 to vote?
Internet articles state that the youth of South Africa don’t vote because of a sense of apathy (lack of interest, enthusiasm, or concern). However, on 16 February ‘16 we conducted a survey of sorts ourselves and interviewed around 200 people between the ages of 18 and 25, asking them two very simple questions:
Do you vote?
If yes, why? If no, why not?
If yes, why? If no, why not?
Turns out apathy isn’t exactly the reason as to why the youth don’t vote. According to our field research it all comes down to a sense of hopelessness among young people. They’re not interested in voting because they feel it won’t make a difference. This is the problem we now identified. It was no up to us to give the youth of SA hope which complicated the task a lot more. So after hours of brainstorming we changed our approach. We created the "Everything but an X" campaign which is based on the principle of spoiling the voting ballot. It means that when you’re in the voting station you don’t follow the rules by marking only one box with an x- you mark all of them... or draw pictures or vote for yourself, or write down lyrics, or do a quick brainstorming session or whatever you feel in your heart needs to be jotted down on a piece of paper. It basically means that you make any kind of mark other than an only X. #spoiltheballot is a form of protest! and believe it or not you’re lyric filled ballot will still be counted just not in favour of a certain party. If you don’t know who to vote for, spoil the ballot. If you want to proclaim your disgust with the government, spoil the ballot. If you’ve lost hope, you don’t feel like any of the parties are worth voting for, or you’re just unhappy with the situation you’re in but believe that you’re vote won’t make a difference, spoil the ballot. This is what the campaign stood for. It is a campaign that would encourage non-voters to in some way make their mark. Spoilt ballots have never been a problem in SA so no real attention has been paid to such a cause. However if 2 million people decided to all spoil their ballot as a form of protest to express their irritation with the government sooner or later change is bound to come. Because a spoilt ballot is better than no vote at all. It will force the parties to rethink their strategies and actually make a difference. The campaign exists of various print media, posters, stickers, zines and large ballot papers that would be pasted up on walls where anyone can go and write anything to illustrate the #spoiltheballot idea. The campaign is also represented by an app that allows people to create their own #spoiltheballot artwork and upload it to social media in support of the cause. Naturally the campaign is represented on social media such as Facebook and Twitter. The entire campaign is cheaply manufactured to tie in with its aggressive look and feel. Defacing politicians and the use of a lot of protest imagery was vital to completing the campaign and sending the message that the people of SA have the voice.
The app opens up (1) and provides the standard "ugly" ballot (2) which represents the campaign and gives various options for creating a spoilt ballot. The final ballot will be uploaded to social media using the #spoiltheballot and #everythingbutanX hashtags (3) to show public support for the campaign.
Massive "ugly" ballot papers, containing all the South African official parties, that would be pasted up in public spaces for people to ruin as a 3D activation concept for the campaign
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Awareness posters
Stickers
Cheaply manufactured zines to distribute among the youth of South Africa. The 8 page zines contain explanations of what the Everything but an X campaign stands for. The zines are an expansion of the campaign to raise awareness.
