Public governance, agility and pandemics: a case study of the UK response to COVID-19
| Author | Paul Joyce |
| Published date | 01 September 2021 |
| Date | 01 September 2021 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0020852320983406 |
Article
International
Review of
Administrative
Sciences
Public governance, agility
and pandemics: a case
study of the UK response
to COVID-19
Paul Joyce
University of Birmingham, UK
Abstract
The UK government’s leaders initially believed that it was among the best-prepared
governments for a pandemic. By June 2020, the outcome of the collision between the
government’s initial confidence, on the one hand, and the aggressiveness and virulence
of COVID-19, on the other, was evident.The UK had one of the worst COVID-19
mortality rates in the world. This article explores the UK government’s response to
COVID-19 from a public administration and governance perspective. Using factual
information and statistical data, it considers the government’s preparedness and stra-
tegic decisions, the delivery of the government response, and public confidence in the
government.
Points for practitioners
Possible lessons for testing through application include:
1. Use the precautionary principle to set planning assumptions in government strate-
gies to create the possibility of government agility during a pandemic.
2. Use central government’s leadership role to facilitate and enable local initiative and
operational responses, as well as to take advantage of local resources and assets.
3. Choose smart government responses that address tensions between the goal of
saving lives and other government goals, and beware choices that are unsatisfactory
compromises.
Corresponding author:
Paul Joyce, University of Birmingham, INLOGOV, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK.
Email: P.Joyce.1@bham.ac.uk
International Review of Administrative
Sciences
!The Author(s) 2021
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/0020852320983406
journals.sagepub.com/home/ras
2021, Vol. 87(3)536–555
Keywords
decision-making, good governance, multi-level government, performance, public admin-
istration, public management, strategy
Introduction
1
In 2020, the UK was one of a number of countries that suffered a relatively high
loss of life as a result of COVID-19 but then managed to get the spread of the virus
under control (at least until the autumn). One of the key issues to be addressed in
this article is: how can we explain the UK government’s failure to contain the virus
and prevent it spreading but then its success in getting the epidemic back under
control?
The UK government’s handling of COVID-19 will be examined from a gover-
nance perspective. The key events and consequences of the governance of the
pandemic will be analysed. This will entail looking at the preparedness for the
pandemic, for example, in respect of the capacity for surveillance using Public
Health England’s test and trace resources. The governance and coordination struc-
tures and the modes of crisis management (Baubion, 2013) used by the UK gov-
ernment will be analysed, and the transition that occurred in late March and April
will be pinpointed as part of the analysis of the dynamics of the response. The
critical nature of the risk assessments used in response planning will be highlighted,
including their origins in a government pandemic flu strategy dating from 2011.
The final section concludes that the UK government’s planning and prepara-
tions for a pandemic ill-prepared it for COVID-19. It will also be concluded that
the UK government made an abrupt transition in its mode of crisis management
and then appeared to be engaged in a chaotic form of ‘muddling through’, starting
with the decision to begin the first of two national lockdowns.
Governance of a pandemic
Baubion’s (2013) discussion of old and new ways in which governments manage
crises can provide some ideas about the governance of COVID-19. He claimed that
governments in the past mainly relied on ‘siloed approaches’, in which crisis man-
agement is on a sector-by-sector basis, rather than a national basis. He highlighted
a number of specific features of a siloed approach: making risk assessments; devel-
oping emergency plans; budgeting resources for use in an emergency; stockpiling
equipment and supplies; designing structures for the governance of crises; carrying
out training; and running exercises and drills. Scenarios prepared by government
experts, based on previous experiences, may be used as a tool in assessing risks and
preparing plans. It may be inferred from all of this that the intent of this mode of
crisis management is to create a government primed to execute a plan and
resourced to provide response capacity.
537
Joyce
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