Harring Niklas, Jagers Sverker C, Löfgren Åsa
Centre for Collective Action Research, Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg, Sweden.
Centre for Collective Action Research, Department of Economics, University of Gothenburg, Sweden.
World Dev. 2021 Feb;138:105236. doi: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105236. Epub 2020 Oct 17.
In this article we apply a large-scale collective action framework on the spread of the COVID-19 virus. We compare the pandemic with other large-scale collective action problems - such as climate change, antimicrobial resistance and biodiversity loss - which are identified by the number of actors involved (the more actors, the larger the scale); the problem's complexity; and the spatial and temporal distance between the actors causing and being affected by the problem. The greater the extent of these characteristics, the larger the scale of the collective action problem and the smaller the probability of spontaneous collective action. We argue that by unpacking the social dilemma logic underlying the spread of the COVID-19 virus, we can better understand the great variation in policy responses worldwide, e.g., why some countries are adopting harsher policies and enforcing them, while others tend to rely more on recommendations. We claim that one key factor is trust and, more precisely, reciprocal trust, both horizontally among people and also vertically between people and their governments - and vice versa. Citizens must trust that the recommendations they receive from the public authorities are correct, that these are in their (or the collective's) best interest, and that most others will follow the recommendations. Simultaneously, government authorities must trust that their citizens will transform the recommendations into collective action. When this situation is present, we argue that governments enjoy a large degree of collective action capital, which potentially open up for a wider palette of policy options.
在本文中，我们将一个大规模集体行动框架应用于新冠病毒的传播。我们将这场大流行与其他大规模集体行动问题进行比较，比如气候变化、抗菌素耐药性和生物多样性丧失，这些问题是根据所涉及行为体的数量（行为体越多，规模越大）、问题的复杂性以及引发问题和受问题影响的行为体之间的时空距离来确定的。这些特征的程度越高，集体行动问题的规模就越大，自发集体行动的可能性就越小。我们认为，通过剖析新冠病毒传播背后的社会困境逻辑，我们能够更好地理解全球政策应对措施的巨大差异，例如，为什么一些国家采取更严厉的政策并加以执行，而另一些国家则更倾向于依赖建议。我们声称一个关键因素是信任，更确切地说，是相互信任，包括人与人之间的横向信任以及人与政府之间的纵向信任，反之亦然。公民必须相信他们从公共当局收到的建议是正确的，这些建议符合他们（或集体）的最大利益，并且大多数其他人会遵循这些建议。同时，政府当局必须相信其公民会将建议转化为集体行动。当这种情况出现时，我们认为政府拥有大量的集体行动资本，这可能为更广泛的政策选择开辟道路。
