State of Emergency: Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic

Thematic issue of the journal Stan Rzeczy (State of Affairs), edited by Dr Jakub Motrenko (Department of Sociology, University of Warsaw), Dr Franciszek Rakowski (Interdisciplinary Centre for Mathematical and Computational Modelling, University of Warsaw), and Dr Paweł Puczkarski (MPLS Enterprise and Innovation Fellow, Department of Chemistry, Oxford University)

Deadline for submission of abstracts: 15 September 2024

 

Historically, major epidemics have been facts of a total nature, introducing upheaval into all social subsystems. However, the COVID-19 pandemic was the first time we had an event of this magnitude in a modern society with its unprecedented functional complexity. Politicians and experts managing the health crisis caused by a previously unknown variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus initially viewed the end of the pandemic as resulting from the achievement of natural herd immunity, the introduction of an effective vaccine against the pathogen, or reliable treatments for the disease. To care for the exponentially growing number of the sick, hospital infrastructure was developed, personal protective equipment was purchased, virus-testing capabilities were expanded, therapeutic know-how was acquired, and so on. In the first phase of the crisis, the solutions for minimizing the number of victims were mainly those known since the dawn of time, for instance, isolating the sick and maintaining physical distance to prevent further infections. Controlling the development of a biological phenomenon had far-reaching consequences in many areas of social life.

The widespread policy of lockdowns caused layered global disturbances. It quickly came to the awareness of policymakers and the public that a pandemic is not just a narrow medical and logistical problem but a colossal challenge due to shortages of knowledge, procedures, and material and personnel resources; a pandemic is difficult to manage, though with clear borders – a wicked social problem, a mega-crisis with general health (including mental health) dimensions and economic, legal, social, etc., aspects.

An effective COVID-19 policy required the mobilization of enormous resources, including cognitive, material, organizational, symbolic, emotional, and communication resources. The dynamic development of data science in recent years has provided new tools to deal with an old problem. Societies operated under a state of emergency regime for several months. Citizens accepted significant restrictions on their freedoms under the influence of fear or police measures, but also in the face of a widespread belief that policies were based on expert recommendations. In modern knowledge societies, policies require not only legal legitimacy but also scientific justification. Despite the natural uncertainty inherent in the epidemic models used, the vagaries of economic forecasts, the ambiguity of legal interpretations, the experimental ways of introducing new technologies and therapies, the numerous scenarios of collective behaviour in the face of the restrictions or of new ways of communicating with the public, for several months the voice of experts was decisive. In a situation where every action or inaction resulted in far-reaching consequences, the responsibility of those in power grew, and management of the situation required testing previously unknown solutions, adapting to still new circumstances, and constantly developing and synthesizing the available information.

In this issue of State of Affairs, we would like to present the lessons in emergency management that should be learned from the COVID-19 pandemic. Though keeping in mind the saying Winston Churchill immortalised, that “the War Office is always preparing to fight the last war,” we do not propose to plan for what cannot be planned. However, we are confident that the accumulated knowledge will allow us to increase our preparedness and resilience for major crises in the future, not just health ones.

We invite authors to reflect on preparing for crises, based on the experience of the pandemic. We are seeking scholarly articles with practical conclusions, accessible to researchers from different disciplines, experts, and policymakers, not just to a highly specialised audience. We ask for general reflections, not detailed solutions.

We propose the following subject areas, while remaining open to other topics as well:

• lessons for scientists: creating complex epidemic models, creating an overall picture of a pandemic based on the knowledge of various medical professions and specialties;
• lessons for physicians: the cost-benefit calculus in care that is overloading the existing health system, therapies in an emergency-medicine situation;
• lessons for organisational managers: constructing and leading advisory bodies, rules of crisis management, patterns of leadership in extremely difficult situations;
• lessons for community leaders: maintaining high levels of social mobilization, managing tensions in the context of political polarization, controlling mass emotions and social behaviour, providing social goods in times of isolation;
• lessons for communication specialists: diversifying communication channels and forms of messages to different audiences, communication with corona-sceptics and anti-vaccinationists, fear, knowledge, shaming – strategies for convincing the unconvinced;
• lessons for infrastructure developers: creating networks of laboratories, temporary and specialised hospitals, maintaining supply chains;
• lessons for biotechnologists: fast-track biotechnology innovations, how to effectively manage the innovation process;
• lessons for lawyers: “epidemic emergency” versus “state of emergency,” quarantine and compulsory vaccination as restrictions on personal freedoms.

/// Submissions, including the title, an abstract of no more than 500 words, and the author’s name, institutional affiliation, and email address, should be sent to redakcja@stanrzeczy.edu.pl by September 15 2024.

/// The editors will inform authors about the acceptance of their abstracts by September 21 2024.

/// The editors will expect to receive the articles, which are not to exceed 1.5 sheets (60,000 characters) and are to be edited according to the technical requirements of the journal, by December 2024 (exact date to be determined with the authors).

/// In the beginning of 2025, the editors are planning an authors’ seminar in order to give authors and editors the opportunity to discuss the articles before they are sent to reviewers. We will expect to receive the final versions of the texts by mid-October.

/// The issue is scheduled to be published in Summer 2025.

The editors of the issue are Dr Jakub Motrenko (jakub.motrenko@stanrzeczy.edu.pl), Dr Franciszek Rakowski, and Dr Paweł Puczkarski.

Language of submissions: English