Routinising and ritualising multiple emergencies: how Lithuania dealt with three crisеs in 2020-2022

• In Event: Responses to Contemporary Crises and Change

Abstract

In 2020 - 2022, Lithuania experienced three crises which the government managed through various types of states of emergency: a pandemic emergency situation, a quarantine, an emergency situation connected to irregular migration from Belarusian, a state of emergency at the border with Belarusian, and a Lithuanian-wide state of emergency due to Russian aggression on Ukraine. This situation of multiple emergencies is intriguing in the way it raises the questions of how and in what way different measures and ideas of emergency fit together in the context of state crisis management and how they are justified and explained. In the paper, these questions are answered by analysing legal documents and their legal and political justifications and through qualitative interviews with decision-makers on their standpoints regarding emergency decisions. The inquiry reveals how emergencies are routinised and ritualised, making the extraordinary/exception an integral part of ordinary politics, even if conducted in the context of various crises

Short Bio

Head of International Relations Department
Institute of International Relations and Political Science, Vilnius University

Author

• Dovilė Jakniūnaitė, Vilnius University