Politics, policy, and pandemic control: a global perspective

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the structural political and economic determinants of country-level severity of the COVID-19 pandemic. By conducting an empirical analysis of 118 countries through the first wave of the pandemic, we show that – unlike natural disasters and past viral outbreaks – national wealth has not insulated countries from the most severe outcomes of COVID-19. Further, we show that timely and responsive policy measures are vital, but so too is the capacity of governments to compel their populations to adhere the chosen policies. While a society's age structure is a key determinant of its COVID-19 mortality rate, we demonstrate that political capacity, combined with an appropriate policy response, outweighs economic and demographic factors in forecasting within-country severity of the pandemic.

RÉSUMÉ

Cet article examine les déterminants politiques et économiques structurels de la gravité de la pandémie de COVID-19 au niveau des pays. En réalisant une analyse empirique de 118 pays pendant la pandémie, nous montrons que – contrairement aux catastrophes naturelles et aux épidémies virales passées – les richesses nationales n'ont pas protégé les pays des conséquences les plus graves de la COVID-19. En outre, nous montrons que des mesures politiques opportunes et réactives sont essentielles, mais que la capacité des gouvernements de contraindre leurs populations à adhérer aux politiques choisies l'est tout autant. Si la structure d'âge d'une société est un facteur déterminant de son taux de mortalité par COVID-19, nous démontrons que la capacité politique, associée à une réponse politique appropriée, l'emporte sur les facteurs économiques et démographiques pour prévoir la gravité de la pandémie à l'intérieur d'un pays.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• coronavirus
• political capacity
• policy

Disclosure statement

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

Notes

1 A Breusch-Pagan Lagrangian multiplier test for random effects demonstrates significant cross-country variance, suggesting that a random effects panel regression is superior to a pooled ordinary least squares estimation technique.

2 A Breusch-Godfrey/Wooldridge test confirms serial correlation in the data. Further, a Dickey-Fuller test shows that the data is nonstationary. Therefore, recognizing the nonlinear, time-dependent trajectories of virus severity, and the subsequent issues this may cause with linear estimation techniques, we present the results of the random effects linear panel regression only as check on the robustness of our GAM result to the chosen estimator.

3 The component indices used to construct the Stringency Index include school closing, workplace closing, cancelling public events, restrictions on gatherings, closing public transit, stay-at-home requirements, restrictions on internal movement, international travel controls, and public information campaigns.

4 The average percent change in mobility was calculated with an average of Google's Community Mobility indicators (excluding residential change), which compares mobility trends to “the median value, for the corresponding day of the week, during the 5-week period Jan 3–Feb 6, 2020 ” as a baseline.

5 The empirical analysis conducted herein was concluded in September of 2020. It is noteworthy that an examination of the most recently updated data does not indicate a substantive change from the first wave to the second wave and beyond. RPR and policy responsiveness continue to contribute to fewer deaths from COVID-19 while GDP per capita and the proportion of population age 80 and older continue to be associated with more COVID-19 deaths.

6 We posit that RPR indicates political capacity independent of regime type. While not included here the addition of a common measure of regime type—Polity Index—neither improves the explanatory power of the model nor does it affect the substantive findings with respect to RPR or policy responsiveness.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nicholas Stowell

Nicholas Stowell is a research fellow at TransResearch Consortium. He earned his PhD in Political Science from Claremont Graduate University in 2021.

Joseph Immormino

Joseph Immormino is a PhD candidate in Political Science with concentrations in Computational Analytics and American Politics at Claremont Graduate University. He is a research fellow at TransResearch Consortium, where his work focuses on empirical evaluations of subnational government's political capacity and their implications for effective policy implementation.

Ana Ortiz Salazar

Ana Ortiz Salazar is a PhD candidate in the International Politics and Political Science program at Claremont Graduate University, with concentrations in Computational Analytics and World Politics. She is a research fellow at the TransResearch Consortium, where her work focuses on the political capacity of subnational governments and its implication on effective policy implementation.

Yuzhu Zeng

Yuzhu Zeng is a PhD Candidate in Political Science at Claremont Graduate University and TRC research fellow, focusing on International Relations and Comparative Politics. Her research interests include governments' political capacity, relations between the US and China, the impact of inequality in the developing world, and demographics changes within a subnational framework.

Marina Arbetman-Rabinowitz

Marina Arbetman-Rabinowitz PhD is a Research Associate at the Maldonado Institute at Claremont Graduate University and at La Sierra University. As a consultant, she worked for the US Government, World Bank, private banks, and financial institutions worldwide. Her research focus is on political and economic development, natural disasters, and conflict. Her expertise is in empirical modelling, data analysis, and measurement. She has done research on political capacity computation and evaluation at the international and subnational level for the last 35 years.