Political institutions, state capacity, and crisis management: A comparison of China and South Korea

Abstract

How do political institutions influence crisis management? By comparing responses to COVID-19 in China and South Korea, this article argues that different political institutions affect countries’ responses to crises by shaping state capacity. First, the article proposes a state capacity-driven crisis management framework including four types of capacity: information capacity, decision-making and implementation capacity, coercive capacity, and mobilization and cooperation capacity. Second, the article contributes to the literature by making linkages between different forms of state capacity and regime type. Combinations of state capacity are different in democracies and authoritarian regimes because state capacities are shaped by two different institutional arrangements: central–local government relations and state–society relations. Additionally, the article finds that the impacts of political institutions on crisis management through different state capacities are contingent on scenarios such as the different stages of a crisis.