> Not saying this is not possible in developed countries. It could very well happen sometime in the future where armed gangs take over polling booths…
I fully expect this happening more as the systems degrade in the west and, arguably, it already has happened several times now in many different ways, even if executed in more “sophisticated” ways that make it less apparent.
What do you call the many “color revolutions” the US and EU have now perpetrated in many different ways and places? The ”gang” was just a state level actor with immense resources and methods that exceed the local capacity to prevent them… just like a local gang using arms to take over a local polling booth.
There are declassified versions of old and obsolete CIA guides on how to conduct the precursors of such “color revolutions” through long term “capacity building” that is then activated if/when necessary. That’s the voluntarily declassified manual of the CIA; someone might suggest there are more effective instructions that are classified.
There have also been medium sophistication level events like what has happened over the last several years in Europe, where Merkel ordered an election result cancelled through technicalities because she/the literal The Party, did not like the result (I guess you can take the woman out of the dictatorship…), the EU simply used the judiciary to force a “runoff” because the election results were not to its liking, de facto canceling elections, or even all the subtle measures like visually misrepresenting election results where the bar or pie chart does not match the numerical data to suppress public mandate and perceptions about results, i.e., higher result numbers being represented by smaller bars than lower numbers.
I would argue they are all examples of the very same things you describe, the equivalent of “…gangs take over polling booths…” only it’s done through process, authority, policy, or even law and those in power tell themselves they’re doing it for “our democracy” and justified through similar dystopian, narcissistic, megalomanic, authoritarian mindsets; “I need to be in power for your own good because you don’t know any better”.
It could go both ways, either things will increasingly start degrading even more as the power slips out of the “gang’s”hands, and the system starts crumbling around them; or if “digital voting” is fully implemented there will essentially be “backdoors” to make sure the powers can “preserve our democracy” just like they need OS backdoors and media control to “protect the children”, which coincidentally seems to always coincide with them remaining in power and control and the people not even being asked about major upheavals of their society and their votes being effectively meaningless because the agenda is continuous regardless of election results.
It’s like those people who used to play slot machines at the casino, (now doing so digitally on their phones) pounding at the buttons that do absolutely nothing since the algorithm is what determines where the spin ends, not them rapidly hitting an essentially dead button just because the “clicking”, the “voting”, makes them think they have control. . . . “our democracy” where you and I are not part of that “our”.