IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/asiaeu/v23y2025i1d10.1007_s10308-025-00719-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Managing the COVID-19 pandemic in varied frameworks of trust, transparency, and governance capacity: evidence from China, the UK, Hong Kong, and Taiwan

Author

Listed:
  • Dionysios Stivas

    (Xi’an Jiaotong Liverpool University)

  • Alistair Cole

    (Sciences-Po)

Abstract

By illuminating the mode of health crisis management in the four distinct jurisdictions of China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the UK, this article considers how varying trust-transparency mixes provide a context for understanding the public governance of the COVID-19 pandemic. The article builds on publicly available surveys, governmental documents, and observations of the assessed administrations’ response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The study covers the period between January 2020 and April 2022. We conclude that though trust is an important element for controlling the virus, transparency is the precondition for a longer-term resilient and sustainable policy response. Trust-transparency mixes matter because they feed through into governance capacity. While transparency is the prerequisite for a longer-term robust and sustainable policy response, trust is essential for managing the virus in the short term. Governance capacity needs to be understood as a contingent, context-specific quality, in the sense of a legitimate steering mechanism.

Suggested Citation

  • Dionysios Stivas & Alistair Cole, 2025. "Managing the COVID-19 pandemic in varied frameworks of trust, transparency, and governance capacity: evidence from China, the UK, Hong Kong, and Taiwan," Asia Europe Journal, Springer, vol. 23(1), pages 81-98, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:asiaeu:v:23:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1007_s10308-025-00719-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s10308-025-00719-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10308-025-00719-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10308-025-00719-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:asiaeu:v:23:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1007_s10308-025-00719-2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.