Crisis Politics in Authoritarian Regimes: How Crises Catalyse Changes under the State–Society Interactive Framework

Chan, Rami Hin-yeung

doi:10.1111/1468-5973.12024

Cited by 21 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 27 publications

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“…And when an incident occurs, in this case the flood, authorities above the lower level must be responsible for alerting citizens through local actors. Lack of preparedness may also relate to local cultural factors, e.g., weak state-society interactions (Chan, 2013).…”

Section: Coordination In Crisis Management: Four Casesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Coordination Structures and Mechanisms for Crisis Management in China: Challenges of Complexity

Christensen

2018

Public Organiz Rev

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When responding to crises, a joint approach is often used, which requires coordination among government agencies and other institutions. In this article we combine the vertical and horizontal dimensions to develop a theoretical framework to explain the patterns and performance of coordination. By drawing on structural-instrumental and institutional perspectives, we examine the coordination structures and mechanisms in China's crisis management at the central and local levels. We outline the main structural characteristics of the Chinese system and the overall challenges it faces. We then discuss four crises that have happened in and around Beijing, using these to understand the crucial factors driving coordination successes and failures. Lastly, we discuss some comparative features and the theoretical and policy implications of our main results.

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Section: Coordination In Crisis Management: Four Casesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Coordination Structures and Mechanisms for Crisis Management in China: Challenges of Complexity

Christensen

2018

Public Organiz Rev

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“…China is a country heavily influenced by Confucianism. Unlike Western democracies, authoritarian in Chinese context places more emphasis on centralized decision making, collectivism, coordinating of all activities of the nation, and public support ( 22 , 23 ), which is considered a value-neutral term ( 24 , 25 ).…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

China's Public Health Policies in Response to COVID-19: From an “Authoritarian” Perspective

Gao

Peng-fei

2021

Front. Public Health

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Background: China is generally regarded internationally as an “authoritarian” state. Traditional definitions have assigned many negative connotations surrounding the term of authoritarian. We realize that it might not be considered value-neutral in other countries. But authoritarian in the Chinese context emphasizes more on centralized decision making, collectivism, coordinating all activities of the nation, and public support, which is considered a value-neutral term. Therefore, it is adopted in this paper. We would like to clarify this. Authoritarian governance is considered an important mechanism for developing China's economy and solving social problems. The COVID-19 crisis is no exception. Most of the current research on crisis management and government crises focuses on advanced, democratic countries. However, the consequences of crisis management by authoritarian governments have not been fully appreciated. Although prior research has addressed authoritarian initiatives to manage crises in China, authoritarian interventions have rarely been theorized in public health emergencies.Methods: Based on a literature review and theoretical analysis, we use a descriptive and qualitative approach to assess public health policies and mechanisms from an authoritarian perspective in China. In light of the key events and intervention measures of China's government in response to COVID-19, the strategic practices of the Communist Party of China (CPC) to construct, embody, or set political goals through authoritarian intervention in public health crisis management are discussed.Results: China's government responded to the COVID-19 pandemic with a comprehensive authoritarian intervention, notably by establishing a top-down leadership mechanism, implementing a resolute lockdown, rapidly establishing square cabin hospitals, enhancing cooperation between different government departments, mobilizing a wide range of volunteer resources, enforcing the use of health codes, imposing mandatory quarantine on those returning from abroad, and implementing city-wide nucleic acid testing. These measures ensured that China was able to contain the outbreak quickly and reflect on the unique role of the Chinese authoritarian system in responding to public health crises.Conclusions: Our paper contributes to expanding the existing understanding of the relationship between crisis management and authoritarian system. China's response to COVID-19 exemplifies the unique strengths of authoritarian institutions in public health crisis management, which is a helpful and practical tool to further enhance the CPC's political legitimacy. As a socialist model of crisis management with Chinese characteristics, it may offer desirable experiences and lessons for other countries still ravaged by the epidemic.

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“…For media, the framing and attributing responsibility of a transnational crisis align with the national interest of the media's country of origin (Yan and Kim, 2015) and media's ideological stances (Wu, 2006). In China, a rapidly escalating crisis may lead to a governance crisis and damage government legitimacy (Chan, 2013). As a domestic crisis escalating into an international crisis could threaten national economic interests, the state may mobilize state-owned, party-controlled news media to frame the crisis in a pro-government stance (Wu, 2006).…”

Section: Framing Crisis and Its Political Implicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Towards media systems framework in Asia Chinese and Korean media on framing the initial COVID-19 pandemic

Cho

Wang

2021

International Communication Gazette

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Due to the relative lack of media comparison studies within Asian contexts, theoretical frameworks based in Western societies have been applied to knowledge production in the global South. Using a ‘most different’ design, this study compares the dimensions of media systems reflected in two Chinese and two Korean newspapers in their initial coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic. Content analysis showed statistically significant differences in distribution of sources, topics and valence, usage of frame types, and actors including domestic government and foreign entities held responsible between the two groups of media. Based on political implications of crisis on Chinese and Korean news content, we mainly discuss political instrumentalization and parallelism in the media in an Asian context. Finally, we open up the dimensions of media system from an Asian perspective and address the need for future research.

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Crisis Politics in Authoritarian Regimes: How Crises Catalyse Changes under the State–Society Interactive Framework

Cited by 21 publications

References 27 publications

Coordination Structures and Mechanisms for Crisis Management in China: Challenges of Complexity

Coordination Structures and Mechanisms for Crisis Management in China: Challenges of Complexity

China's Public Health Policies in Response to COVID-19: From an “Authoritarian” Perspective

Towards media systems framework in Asia Chinese and Korean media on framing the initial COVID-19 pandemic

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