Blockchain-Based E-Voting for Developing Nations: A Systematic Review and Empirical Evaluation of a Permissioned Prototype for the Tanzanian Electoral Context

Abstract

Blockchain technology has potential to strengthen electronic voting, yet evidence from developing nations remains limited, particularly under constrained connectivity and centralised electoral governance. This study combined a PRISMA 2020-guided systematic review with empirical evaluation of a permissioned blockchain prototype for the Tanzanian electoral context. The review synthesised 113 peer-reviewed studies published between 2018 and 2026 and identified four recurring vulnerability classes: human-factor threats at the edge, latency and partition risks, algorithmic opacity, and challenges of coercion resistance. A Hyperledger Fabric prototype was implemented with separate voter-registry and vote-casting chaincodes linked through a one-way cryptographic token. Evaluation used a synthetic dataset of 25,000 voters across 50 polling stations. All nine functional security tests passed, and Hyperledger Caliper completed 1,800 transactions without failure, achieving 99.8 vote-casting transactions per second at sub-second average latency in the tested laboratory configuration. Performance was also stable between the earlier 1,000-voter and 25,000-voter loaded-state runs. These findings support the technical feasibility of the implemented permissioned architecture under controlled conditions, but they do not establish national-scale performance or complete electoral security. Geographically distributed testing, production identity-system integration, coercion-resistant mechanisms, data-protection validation and usability evaluation remain necessary before operational deployment.