Beyond COVID‐19: Five commentaries on expert knowledge, executive action, and accountability in governance and public administration

Abstract

Several Canadian and international scholars offer commentaries on the implications of the COVID‐19 pandemic for governments and public service institutions, and fruitful directions for public administration research and practice. This first suite of commentaries focuses on the executive branch, variously considering: the challenge for governments to balance demands for accountability and learning while rethinking policy mixes as social solidarity and expert knowledge increasingly get challenged; how the policy‐advisory systems of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and United Kingdom were structured and performed in response to the COVID‐19 crisis; whether there are better ways to suspend the accountability repertoires of Parliamentary systems than the multiparty agreement struck by the minority Liberal government with several opposition parties; comparing the Canadian government’s response to the COVID‐19 pandemic and the Global Financial Crisis and how each has brought the challenge of inequality to the fore; and whether the COVID‐19 pandemic has accelerated or disrupted digital government initiatives, reinforced traditional public administration values or more open government.

The Use of ICT by Local General Administrative Authorities during COVID-19 for a Sustainable Future: Comparing Five European Countries

“…Although the importance of digitalization seems to be universal across studied EU countries (Czech Republic, Germany, Poland, Romania, and Slovenia), still, these issues show that the digitalization of public administration is not an isolated dimension but must be promoted and enforced in compliance with the rule of law, related macroeconomic indicators of each country, and the EU as a whole. In this sense, the permanent digital transformation as a final outcome of contemporary administrative relations in general and procedures in particular [39,42,53,54] remains a goal requiring intensive work. Namely, the present simplifications based on the COVID-19 pandemic are temporary in nature and show there is potential yet also caveats to take care of while introducing a systemic approach.…”

Canada’s legal preparedness against the COVID‐19 Pandemic: A scoping review of federal laws and regulations

“…Some scholars argue the pandemic paved the way for the federal minority government to be less accountable to the parliament by limiting the parliament proceedings and debates. Unlike Canada, the UK and Australia debated the COVID‐19 response legislation, and the governments were held to account (Boin et al 2020 ).…”

“…First, realities of minority parliament in the country — the federal government is a minority government and formed the government with other parties' support. The minority parliament provided an opportunity to amend the Financial Administration Act and enact federal aid packages such as the COVID‐19 Emergency Response Act (C‐13) for the welfare of Canadians across provinces (Boin et al 2020 ). Second, the weakened state of the federal infrastructure for health— the healthcare facilities are among the oldest public infrastructure, and nearly half of all facilities are over 50 years old (HealthCareCAN 2020 ).…”

Introduction to the Themed collection: Public sector employment relations in turbulent times

“…This pattern is being followed in other countries, as debt was used by governments to reduce the impact of COVID-19 and to fund the programs necessary to support individuals' welfare, corporations' survival and essential public services. There is increasing concern over the forms of governance and accountability standards being applied to pandemic-related public debt and expenditures (Boin et al, 2020). Although the future consequences of this spending are yet to be fully revealed, a new era of public sector austerity may be inevitable.…”