Assessing the Multi-level Government Response to the COVID-19 Crisis: Italy and Spain Compared

ABSTRACT

This article compares the functioning of the intergovernmental systems in Italy and Spain facing the COVID-19 crisis. Combining the public administration literature on policy learning and multi-level governance with that on the institutional collective action framework, this article analyses if and how Italy and Spain have reacted and learned from the external pressures of the pandemic, leading to institutional adjustments to the respective multi-level governance systems in the de-escalation of the first emergency phase. In doing so, the article tests the general hypothesis that the existing political structures and dynamics are a crucial variable to explain the different performance in the pandemic response management. The framework presented in this article could be extended to other countries that follow a federal logic in healthcare provision by public administration scholars who are interested in crisis management studies.

KEYWORDS:

• Policy learning
• multi-level governance
• institutional collective action framework
• COVID-19
• healthcare federalism

Acknowledgments

The authors contributed equally to this work. The authors would like to thank International Journal of Public Administration’s editors and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable advice and comments on previous versions of this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Policy paradigm can be defined as the “basic framework of ideas and standards according to which a social problem is interpreted and the policy made” (Hall, 1993, pp. 279.).

2. Cf. Real Decreto 463/2020.

3. Cf. Interview with government adviser, October 7th, 2020.

4. Cf. Real Decreto-Ley 21/2020, de 9 de junio.

5. Cf. Real Decreto 722/2020, de 31 de julio.

6. In fact the Spanish Government had to Declare the State of Alarm in Madrid Region (Real Decreto 900/2020, de 9 de octubre) against the stark opposition of the regional government.

7. Cf. Real Decreto 926/2020, de 25 de Octubre.

8. Cf. Interview with government adviser, October 21th, 2020.

9. Cf. Interview with senior regional adviser, December 10th, 2020.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mattia Casula

Mattia Casula is currently a Research Fellow in Political Science at the University of Bologna. He had visiting positions at the European University Institute in Florence, at the University of Strathclyde and at the University of Edinburgh. His research interests and publications are in the field of public policy and administration, with a focus on subnational and local levels. Former member of the Board of the Regional Studies Association, he is currently member of the Executive Committee of the Italian Political Science Association and co-coordinator of its Standing Group “Regional Studies and Local Policies”. His last book is “Economic Growth and Cohesion Policy Implementation in Italy and Spain: Institutions, Strategic Choices, Administrative Change” (Casula, 2020a). [Corresponding author, [email protected]]

Serafín Pazos-Vidal

Serafín Pazos-Vidal (PhD European Union) is the Head of the Brussels Office of the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA), leading EU policy development and negotiation as well as acting as its main Brussels interface. Over the last 15 years, he has led various EU campaigns notably as chair of the CEMR expert group on Cohesion. He has drafted or contributed to various reports from the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities, Committee of the Regions, European Parliament or the European Commission. He is a published researcher on Cohesion Policy, comparative decentralization, urban policy and regional para-diplomacy. His last book is “Subsidiarity and EU Multilevel Governance: Actors, Networks and Agendas” (Routldege, 2019).