Nordic Crisis Management

Nordic Crisis Management

Well-Performing Governance During COVID-19

This book provides the first comparative analysis of how state size and administrative scale influenced responses to the COVID-19 pandemic across the five Nordic states and two territories. It produces valuable insight into how state size, polity and structural arrangements, and culture influenced the management of the crisis in Denmark, the Faroe Islands, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. In an era of recurring global crises, the book offers critical lessons for policymakers, crisis leaders, and public administration scholars.

This masterpiece, decades in the making, is delivered just in time. There is much to learn here about how trust and accountability go hand in hand and how the systems put in place are shaped by values, culture, and the people in them.
-Lina Svedin, Professor of Strategy and Security Studies, Air University, Maxwell AFB, Alabama
This book should be on each ‘preparedness’-shelf since we can learn from Nordic experiences. Their COVID-19-lessons-learned allow to anticipate how to ensure a trust-driven resilient response to the next system-quake.
– Geert Bouckaert, KU Leuven Public Governance Institute
The book shows how a natural experiment – the spread of COVID across the globe – works out in a most similar systems design, revealing key variables that played a role in achieving different outcomes.
– Sandra van Thiel, Professor of Public Management, Erasmus University Rotterdam
This book is an important step towards a better understanding of both crises and how to management them.
– Anders Wivel, Professor of International Relations, University of Copenhagen
There is no better time to test the practice of governance than under crisis conditions. Read on, and prepare for the next crisis!
-Godfrey Baldacchino, Professor of Sociology, University of Malta, and Executive Editor, Small States & Territories journal
This book provides the first comparative analysis of how state size and administrative scale influenced responses to the COVID-19 pandemic across the five Nordic states and two territories. It produces valuable insight into how state size, polity and structural arrangements, and culture influenced the management of the crisis in Denmark, the Faroe Islands, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. In an era of recurring global crises, the book offers critical lessons for policymakers, crisis leaders, and public administration scholars.
Ásthildur Elva Bernhardsdottir is Professor of Crisis Management at Bifröst University, Iceland.
Baldur Thorhallsson is Professor of Political Science at University of Iceland, Iceland.

“It is a certainty that there will be another system-quake triggered by a health, or cyber, or natural disaster. This book provides a GPS (Governance Positioning System) to handle the next systemic turbulence. Based on a comparison of how Nordic countries and territories handled the COVID-19-crisis, a GPS was developed looking at risk reduction, decision-making, leadership, communication, and learning within a framework of capacity, structures and polity features, and culture. This book should be on each ‘preparedness’-shelf since we can learn from Nordic experiences. Their COVID-19-lessons-learned allow to anticipate how to ensure a trust-driven resilient response to the next system-quake.” (Geert Bouckaert, KU Leuven Public Governance Institute)

“This edited volume shows how, despite the commonalities of the Nordic model, the COVID19 crisis was managed in different ways in the seven Nordic countries and territories. That makes this book a relevant academic contribution to the literature on crisis management and governance traditions. But it also has interesting methodological aspects, as it shows how a natural experiment – the spread of COVID across the globe – works out in a most similar systems design, revealing key variables that played a role in achieving different outcomes. That makes it an interesting read for academics from all disciplines.” (Sandra van Thiel, Professor of Public Management, Erasmus University Rotterdam)

“There is no better time to test the practice of governance than under crisis conditions. Hence the usefulness and timeliness of this collection, focussed on how five, small, Nordic countries and two territories ‚managed‘ the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020-22. A pesky virus tested administrative rigour, popular culture and civic trust in government. Read on, and prepare for the next crisis!” (Godfrey Baldacchino, Professor of Sociology, University of  Malta, Executive Editor, Small States & Territories journal)

“In a world of recurring crises, we need to know more about how state size, polity, structural arrangements, and culture influence crisis management. This book is an important step towards a better understanding of both crises and how to management them. It will be of interest to students of Nordic politics, small states and crisis management more generally.” (Anders Wivel, Professor of International Relations, University of Copenhagen)

Highlights

• Provides the first comparative analysis of how state size influenced responses to Covid-19 in all five Nordic states Highlights the strengths and limitations of internal governance in small states with regards to crisis management Bridges theoretical gaps between crisis studies and small-state literature

Über den Autor

Ásthildur Elva Bernhardsdottir is Professor of Crisis Management at Bifröst University, Iceland.

Baldur Thorhallsson is Professor of Political Science at University of Iceland, Iceland.