Election Promise Tracking: Extending the Shelf Life of Democracy in Digital Journalism Practice and Scholarship

While global fact-checking practice pivots away from its political origins towards debunking projects for platform partners, the subfield of election promise tracking provides an interesting counterpoint. Little scholarly attention has been paid to the international rise and significance of Campaign Pledge Evaluation Tools (CPETs), which are digital platforms that directly inform voters about the fulfilment of election campaign promises throughout the political term. This article therefore asks: How do the routines and boundaries of journalism shape CPETs that are created and operated by fact-checkers? Analysis of interviews with fact-checkers and political scientists involved in researching, designing, and producing Australia’s RMIT ABC Promise Tracker demonstrates that election promise tracking is a subset of fact-checking that remains committed to the normative values and traditions of public interest journalism through information provision with a clear democratic aim and outcome.