1st Edition

State–Society Relations around the World through the Lens of the COVID-19 Pandemic Rapid Test

Edited By Federica Duca, Sarah Meny-Gibert Copyright 2024
282 Pages 26 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

282 Pages 26 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

282 Pages 26 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

The collection examines state–society relations during the COVID-19 pandemic, from governance at the outset of the pandemic to vaccine rollouts, via a series of case studies from around the world. With a focus on the Global South, the book includes chapters on the experiences of – Angola, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Bolivia, Argentina, Brazil, Jamaica and Indonesia as well as contributions from the... Read more

Introduction – A ‘Rapid Test’: States and Societies Through the Lens of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Federica Duca and Sarah Meny-Gibert

Part I: Decentering the Pandemic

1. ‘The Country's Problem Is Not the Coronavirus': Multiple Crises in Bolivia

Alice Soares Guimarães

2. Recentering the Necropolitics of COVID-19: A Perspective From Angola

Ruy Llera Blanes

3. COVID-19 and Non-State People: Uncompromised Wild Food Consumption in Binga, Zimbabwe

Luzibo Ottilia Munsaka and Vupenyu Dzingirai

Part II: Exclusion and Inequality

4. Viral Contradictions: Canadian Exceptionalism and COVID-19

Adrian Murray

5. Unequal Pandemics: COVID-19 in Jamaica

Doreen Gordon, Moji Anderson, Heather Ricketts and Michael Yee Shui

6. Protecting the Vulnerable? COVID-19 Policy in Sweden

Rebecca Rhodin and Johan Wedel

Part III: State Capacity and Legitimacy

7. Brazil: Tragedy and Political Choices in the Face of COVID-19

José Maurício Domingues

8. COVID-19 and Political Crisis: State Capacity and Defiance in Argentina

María Maneiro and Diego Alejandro Pacheco

9. Negotiating Ritual Life in Indonesia: State and Worship in Times of COVID-19

Clotilde Riotor

Part IV: Trust, Solidarity and Time

10. Mutations of Democracy: Aotearoa New Zealand’s COVID-19 Response

Monique Jonas, Naomi Simon-Kumar and Rachel Simon-Kumar

11. Populist Governance in Times of Crisis: COVID-19 in the Czech Republic

Jiří Kohoutek

12. Rallying the Nation: Institutional Trust and South Africa’s Pandemic Experience

Joleen Steyn Kotze, Narnia Bohler-Muller, Martin Bekker and Ngqapheli Mchunu

Biography

Federica Duca is a senior researcher at the Public Affairs Research Institute and a research associate at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa. Her research focuses on state–society relations and the relationship between spatial and social forms in relation to wealth and privilege, as well as citizenship and the changing form of the nation-state.

Sarah Meny-Gibert is head of the state reform programme at the Public Affairs Research Institute and is a research associate at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa. Her research interests are in civil service reform and its histories, the sociology of public bureaucracies, and state–citizen relations in the governance of public education.

“The Covid-19 pandemic may have started as a health concern, but it rapidly affected broader state-society relations. In recognising this impact, this book provides a necessary and important reflection on how the pandemic was governed in 12 intriguing country case studies. It is an essential read for scholars interested in the governance of a crisis.” 

Fiona Anciano, Professor of Political Studies, University of the Western Cape, South Africa