State Structures and Interventions for COVID-19 Outbreaks

• In Event: Subnational Variations in Healthcare Infrastructure

Abstract

The outbreak of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has caused widespread public anxiety and enormous economic loss, posing massive challenges for political leaders around the world. The paper focuses on the politics surrounding epidemic and pandemic outbreaks, particularly, how structural features of political institutions affect government responses to the outbreaks of COVID-19. I argue that for all types of regimes the variation in outbreak responses depends critically on the institutional features of social control and social inclusion. Based on the rich literature of state-society relations and John Gerring's centripetal theory, social control is defined as a state’s capacity or tendency to form and implement authoritative public decisions independent of social pressure, and social inclusion means a state’s capacity or tendency to accommodate broad social interests relevant to the decisions.
In times of crisis like a pandemic, the higher the degree of social control, the more likely is the government to successfully mobilize and coordinate different resources and sectors in the society, neutralize opposing interests, and implement consistent containment measures in a timely fashion once it has the will to do so. The higher the degree of social inclusion, the higher is the chance for the government to make well-deliberated decisions sensitive to various tradeoffs and competing interests and elicit voluntary compliance.
The first part of the paper includes a cross-sectional analysis based on global data sets including original data measuring features of political institutions. The second part of paper presents a detailed case study that compares Covid responses in two Chinese cities, Shenzhen and Hong Kong, which share significant socioeconomic and cultural similarities but are substantially different in terms of political and bureaucratic structures. Fieldwork findings so far suggest that because Shenzhen has a higher level of social control and a lower level of social inclusion than Hong Kong, the local government of Shenzhen can be more effective in terms of mobilizing and coordinating resources, neutralizing opposing interests, and implementing consistent NPIs in a timely fashion once containing the pandemic becomes a national priority. However, the Hong Kong government is unable to manage the pandemic in a similar fashion, for it has to balance the national priority with local interests, makes well-deliberated decisions that are sensitive to tradeoffs and public opinions, and depends critically on voluntary compliance.

Author

• Elvis H Kim, University of West Florida