Federalism in times of crisis

The worldwide coronavirus pandemic laid low much of the world in 2021-2022 but also highlighted the performance of governments and institutions that protected their citizens and their economy. Federalism became a special focus of both praise and condemnation in dealing with COVID-19 issues and fallout. Federalism scholars rose to the occasion in analyzing individual countries (especially the U.S.), other federal countries, and sometimes comparing federal and nonfederal countries’ responses. This chapter summarizes and critiques that scholarship, highlighting blame-casting, governmental “hand-offs” of responsibility, intergovernmental conflicts, the importance of local governments in dealing with the public health issues, and what we have learned from the pandemic. Of special interest is a case study of data collection issues that were plagued with varying quality responses from the states and localities. Unfortunately, there is little evidence that policy changes are underway to correct some problems that emerged during the crisis.