New members of the International Commission for Zoological Nomenclature are elected via a secret ballot held under the auspices of the International Union of Biological Sciences (IUBS), as mandated by the ICZN Constitution (Article 4) and Bylaws. Traditionally, voting has occurred during an ICZN General Session at IUBS meetings or at meetings officially sanctioned by the IUBS that are widely attended by zoologists, or through by-elections within the Commission itself. The Constitution mandates such voting to occur in a session of the ‘Section of Zoological Nomenclature’, but at the latest General Session, which was held in conjunction with the 32nd General Assembly of the IUBS in Berlin, Germany, December 2015, the number of people voting was as low as 16.
The retirement of several Commissioners during the past two years resulted in five vacancies. The Commission originally planned for voting to be held concurrently during the 23rd International Congress of Zoology (ICZ), Cape Town and the XXVI International Congress of Entomology in Helsinki in 2020. Both of these conferences, however, were postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The ICZ was eventually held on-line, and the Commission approached the Organising Committee of the ICZ to establish a registration and voting portal under the name ‘Section of Zoological Nomenclature’ as specified in the ICZN Constitution and Bylaws. In November 2021, members of the international zoological community were invited through relevant mailing lists (e.g., Taxacom, ICZNlist) as well as the ICZN website to register to vote in the election and, once registered, were given access to a SurveyMonkey voting form that was administered by the ICZN Council. Voters could choose between 10 candidates, whose biographies were available on the ICZN website, and could vote for up to five Commissioners.
The Commission received 575 registrations from 50 different countries. Votes were subsequently received from 425 of these registrants, with a total of 1,396 votes. The identity of the voters was not revealed to Council, thus maintaining the anonymity required for a secret ballot.
委员会收到了来自50个不同国家的575份注册申请。随后，425名注册者参与了投票，总投票数为1,396票。选民的身份未向理事会透露，从而确保了秘密投票所需的匿名性。
The five nominees with the greatest number of votes were, in alphabetical order: Luis Ceríaco (Portugal; Reptilia, Amphibia, Mammalia), Nikita Kluge (Russia; Ephemeroptera, Insecta), Paulo Lucinda (Brazil; Ichthyology), Cristina Scioscia (Argentina; Arachnology) and Daniel Whitmore (Germany; Diptera). They have been duly appointed as Commissioners with their terms commencing on 1 January 2022. Biosketches of the Commissioners currently serving are available from the ICZN website (https://www.iczn.org/about-the-iczn/commissioners/).
得票数最多的五名候选人按字母顺序排列如下：Luis Ceríaco（葡萄牙；爬行动物、两栖动物、哺乳动物）、Nikita Kluge（俄罗斯；蜉蝣目、昆虫纲）、Paulo Lucinda（巴西；鱼类学）、Cristina Scioscia（阿根廷；蛛形学）和Daniel Whitmore（德国；双翅目）。他们已正式被任命为委员，任期自2022年1月1日开始。现任委员的简历可在ICZN网站（https://www.iczn.org/about-the-iczn/commissioners/）查阅。
The benefits of an on-line voting platform are obvious. It allowed voters from all over the world to participate in an event that was previously available only to those people who could afford to travel to and attend an international congress. Indeed, receiving votes from 425 zoologists from 50 countries most likely represents a level of diversity that has never been previously achieved by the Commission when electing new Commissioners, and certainly not within the living memory of the current Council.
在线投票平台的优势显而易见。它使得世界各地的选民都能参与这一活动，而此前只有那些能够负担得起旅行并参加国际会议的人才能参与。事实上，收到来自50个国家的425名动物学家的投票，很可能代表了委员会在选举新委员时从未达到过的多样性水平，这无疑超出了现任理事会的记忆范围。
While this ballot represents a major improvement in Commission activities, the Commission is keen to improve the mechanism of inclusive international voting in future ballots, and suggestions for improvement from the community would be welcome (send comments to iczn@nus.edu.sg).
