Countries have experienced varied success in controlling the COVID-19 pandemic. To understand these variations, the study used netnography on news media and websites, and social media. Factors identified as critical to success in managing the pandemic fall into two categories: state-centric and socio-demographic. State-centric factors such as policy learning and implementation structure, and technological and administrative readiness have influenced success. Contextual factors such as a country's demographic profile (e.g., age), family structure (multigenerational family), and cultural attributes (e.g., kissing and hugging to greet) also shape the effectiveness of policies for controlling the pandemic.

The existing literature on institutional trust leads us to expect that institutional trust is determined by institutional performance. In the context of three South Asian countries (Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka), we find the opposite – that despite poor performance of the civil service, there is high institutional trust. In this study we examine whether such mismatch can be explained by an authoritarian cultural orientation, which generates unquestioning obedience and loyalty and may contribute to inflated institutional trust in the civil service of these countries.

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This study explores the relationship between gender representation in bureaucracy and perceived performance and fairness. It uses data from a survey experiment that was part of a national representative survey conducted in Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. In the experiment, respondents were informed about a hypothetical 10-member committee responsible for controlling violence against women and that it processes around 150 cases per year. The committee composition was then manipulated based on gender representation to capture whether women's representation in the committee mattered for respondents' evaluation of its performance and fairness.The study finds that in a "no representation" scenario, respondents reported the lowest perceived performance and fairness, while in scenarios such as "equal representation" or "over representation" of women, they reported higher perceived performance and fairness. Furthermore, variations in perceived performance are found to be associated with changing expectations of fair treatment generated by the different representations of women.Performance measurement is a key tool for mapping the effectiveness of organizations. Accurate measurements, however, are often difficult to achieve, especially for public organizations. The mapping of citizens' perceptions through surveys is considered a possible mechanism, but these surveys are often beset with different kinds of challenges and do not necessarily reflect reality. For example, people react more to any negative experience than a