Introduction. The Covid‐19 pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic has caused massive loss of life and economic and social disruption on an enormous scale. According to estimates from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the global economy shrank by slightly less than 4.5 per cent in 2020, the worst contraction since the 1930s. The impacts on the hospitality and tourism sectors have been particularly severe. While gauging the worldwide death toll directly attributable to the pandemic is extremely difficult, the World Health Organization estimates excess mortality in 2020 due to the virus to be at least three million. Heroic efforts to develop and administer vaccines have helped to reduce the spread and impacts of Covid-19 around the world, yet new variants continue to surface. The emergency is far from over. This special issue of Disasters explores the wide-ranging impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic—and the responses to it—on governments, economies, and societies across the planet. In the opening paper, Markus Fraundorfer and Neil Winn look at the limitations of Westphalian notions of national sovereignty and self-interest in the context of a global, cross-border threat, and the opportunities that the Covid-19 experience may provide to create the conditions for a new, post-Westphalian form of governance. David Keen then explores the political economy of the Covid-19 response in the United Kingdom and the United States to highlight why these two mature democracies appear to have failed to offer effective protection to their populations. Utilising data from 10 European countries, Kati Orru et al. assess the policy consequences for the provision of social care during the pandemic, and the measures care organisations have taken to adapt. Next, Yunhao Wang, Zhiqiang Fang, and Wei Gao appraise the impacts of the pandemic on the Chinese economy through an analysis of rail passenger numbers, suggesting that the effects may not be as severe as is widely assumed. Renata Cavalcanti Muniz et al. trace the devastating outcomes of the pandemic in Brazil, alongside civil society responses among three key groups: domestic workers; the urban poor in favelas; and indigenous Amazonians. This analysis is set against the backdrop of a national leadership that has consistently downplayed the dangers of the virus and a largely ineffective federal government response. The idea of ‘resistance at the margins’ also informs the contribution of Courtney Page-Tan and Tanya Buhler Corbin, which investigates the unequal and inconsistent application of protective policies in the US and the efforts of local and state governments to promote safer behaviour given clear failings at the federal level. Nils Carstensen, Mandeep Mudhar, and Freja Schurmann Munksgaard focus on community-level mutual aid, analysing both the strengths and the limitations of spontaneous community responses, and the need for more effective and consistent national and international support. The interaction between conflict and the pandemic response is the theme of Dorothea Hilhorst and Rodrigo Mena's paper, in particular the way authorities in conflict-affected and fragile states have instrumentalised the response, and the impacts of low levels of public trust in the measures of governments in these countries to tackle the pandemic. Concentrating specifically on Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and South Sudan, Tom Kirk et al. consider how the pandemic has opened up opportunities for a wider range of local authorities, including chiefs, humanitarian organisations, criminal gangs, and armed groups, to challenge and contest more established forms of state authority, as well as the long-term effects on local conceptualisations of statehood. Cash assistance in the Covid-19 response is the subject of Julie Lawson-McDowall, Ruth McCormack, and Sophie Tholstrup's submission. Drawing on inputs from members of the CALP Network, the authors highlight the role of cash assistance through humanitarian and social assistance channels in saving lives and protecting livelihoods during the pandemic. The issue concludes with an evaluation of the financial impacts of the pandemic on Syrian refugees in Turkey. Ezgi Elçi, Eda Kirisçioglu, and Aysen Üstübici conclude, based on an online survey, that initial Covid-19 control measures had a greater financial bearing on Syrians than on Turkish citizens, for instance in terms of employment, wealth, and education, in large part due to the structural and policy context in which forcibly displaced Syrians find themselves in Turkey. Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no new data were created or analyzed in this study

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