@article{2022:kraemer:how_do_sta,
title = {How do state authorities act under existential uncertainty? Hypotheses on the social logic of political decision-making processes during the Coronavirus pandemic},
year = {2022},
note = {After a critical examination of the rational model of politics, this
article discusses an alternative explanatory model in order to better
understand and explain state response patterns and decision-making
processes for containing the Coronavirus pandemic in its various
phases from a sociological perspective. In doing so, I draw on central
considerations of political sociology and organisational studies in
order to reconstruct the social logic of the (non-)action of state
authorities with special regard to the case examples of Germany and
Austria (action under radical uncertainty, expert delegation,
isomorphism of state action, path dependency of decisions, promissory
legitimacy, collective morality of the “anxiety community” as a
social driver of pandemic management). The article concludes with some
general considerations on the vaccination exit strategy as well as on
the problem of strategic ignorance and the logic of
performative-symbolic action by state decision-makers.},
journal = {Culture, Practice & Europeanization},
pages = {5--36},
author = {Kraemer, Klaus},
volume = {7},
number = {1}
}