Policy performance in crisis: evaluating federalism and multi-party governance

Abstract

Federalism and multiparty systems are two institutional arrangements that affect institutional friction and centralization, which shape governments’ capacities to manage crises. Evaluating the cross-national variation of these features enables us to assess how institutional friction and centralization impact policy performance during crisis. Using cumulative COVID-19 cases and deaths in 2020 across a range of 80 countries, we demonstrate that (1) higher levels of regional authority, i.e., federalism, are associated with reduced policy performance, (2) there are discernable between-group differences in performance for each of the institutional factors assessed, and (3) the relationship between policy punctuations and performance is not readily distinguishable in condensed periods of crisis.