A Healthy Performance in Times of a Pandemic : A review of the World Health Organization's policy performance in times of global public health crises

• Main Author: Loinder Arvidsson, Lova
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Stockholms universitet, Institutionen för ekonomisk historia och internationella relationer 2020
• Subjects: WHO; Policy; Performance; Effectiveness; COVID-19; SARS; Policy utförande; effektivitet; Other Social Sciences not elsewhere specified; Övrig annan samhällsvetenskap; Globalisation Studies; Globaliseringsstudier; Social Sciences; Samhällsvetenskap
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:su:diva-190550

This paper explores WHO’s response during the COVID-19 pandemic and compares it to its response during the SARS epidemic in 2003. This is done by examining the organization’s performance through a policy output approach and theoretical perspectives of effectiveness and performance theories. The policy output approach offers an operational model that suggests studying five variables of output applied to the policy documents published by the organization. The results show that WHO has increased its performance and productivity since SARS 2003 which might indicate that the effectiveness of the organization could have increased along with it. However, in order to ultimately establish effectiveness, external factors such as compliance of member states and domestic politics needs to be considered in future studies. This study contributes to the understanding of WHO’s performance in times of crisis and can be used as background for further research on effectiveness.