Governance in the time of COVID‐19: Systemic implications for governing in an Anthropocene world based on experiences from Australia and Brazil

Abstract

The disruption of the COVID‐19 pandemic reveals that contemporary governance systems are not fit for purpose as we progress our living in a human‐induced Anthropocene world. Governance failings of a cybersystemic nature are highlighted through a comparative case study undertaken as a systemic co‐inquiry of acts of governing in relation to pandemic effects in Australia and Brazil. Drawing on recent governance scholarship, key praxis failures in governing were revealed. The systemic implications were explored using a narrative analysis plus use of a simple diagnosis and design heuristic based on 14 cybersystemic conceptual elements. Arguments and evidence for the pressing need to institutionalise cybersystemic governance practices are presented, highlighting how they are critical to systemic design of effective governance systems. Considering that the human‐induced Anthropocene world and climate emergency will have similar patterns to the pandemic, the proposed design heuristic within a rapidly assembled systemic co‐inquiry process has the potential to facilitate dialogue and design for imagining and enacting new alternative governance systems.