Alicia Cheng is a professional designer who currently works for the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in Manhattan as the director of design. She also works for the high end women’s boutique agency mgmt in New York. She earned a masters degree in design at Yale. She also wrote a book on the subject of this article which is called, “This Is What Democracy Looks Like: A Visual History of the Printed Ballot.”
Within this article, Cheng discusses the history of ballot design in relation to social change to show how instrumental ballot design is to democracy. In the mid 19th century, ballots weren’t cast for votes, and instead people voiced their votes more publicly. This grew more difficult as the US population grew, but there were still problems once the ballot system was implemented. Ballots were originally designed by political parties, and they would often contain propaganda on the ballot itself. By the end of the 18th century, America looked to the Australian ballot system as a structure to base their own off of. The Australian government was in charge of creating a nonpartisan, standardized ballot. By the turn of the century, American ballots were state standardized. Cheng ends with a quote from Richard Childs: “The people must take an interest in all their electoral work if they are to be masters.” This makes me wonder how much voting will change now that people do care.
Cheng, Alicia. “The History of Ballot Design Is the History of Democracy.” Eye on
Design, AIGA, 24 Sept. 2020, eyeondesign.aiga.org/the-history-of-ballot-design-is-
the-history-of-democracy/.
