As the initial epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent success in containing it, China’s response to the pandemic has drawn worldwide attention. This article focuses on the organizational response in this episode to reflect on the key characteristics of the Chinese bureaucracy.

China’s response to Covid-19 presents a tale of two periods. In the early period, before the infectiousness of the virus was made public, government bureaucrats had withheld information and discouraged professional voice in this matter. After the outbreak was made public, the same bureaucracy demonstrated its marked capacity in executing the lock-down policy effectively. The same tight-control measures have succeeded in containing the Covid-19 pandemic in China since then.

The irony is that both the failure in the first period and the success of the second period come from the same institutional practice in the Chinese bureaucracy. This article argues and demonstrates that there were a series of organizational failures – political considerations overriding professional judgment, and the use of organizational power in suppression and censorship of information in the public arena in the early period. The same organizational power also facilitated effective nationwide lockdown in the subsequent months.

The tale of the two periods speaks loud about the paradoxes of the authoritarian state. That is, the centralization of power and the tremendous mobilizational capacities of the Chinese state are a two-edged weapon. If right decisions are made, the bureaucratic machine can mobilize tremendous resources to get things done; but wrong decisions or policies may also lead to devastating consequences. The trend of centralization processes in recent years have produced a tightly-coupled central-local government relationships on the eve of the Covid-19 pandemic, which sheds light on the role of the Chinese bureaucracy in this episode.

The same paradox raises questions about how lessons are to be learned about organizational responses in this episode. This episode highlights two key features of the Chinese bureaucracy: its high mobilizational capacity and the underlying political mechanisms. The two go hand in hand as the causes of both organizational failure in the first period and the successful implementation of lock in the second. In a stark contrast, they offer two opposing lessons to be learned. How these lessons are learned will affect how the Chinese bureaucracy will respond to future crises and future course of institutional changes in China.

Read the full article ‘Organizational Response to Covid-19 Crisis: Reflections on the Chinese bureaucracy and Its Resilience’ published in Management and Organization Review

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