ABSTRACT

This book assesses the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for the European Union (EU), as well as its response in dealing with an overarching, multidimensional crisis with consequences extending beyond public health safety to political, economic, legal, and institutional arenas.

It argues the pandemic represents a symmetric crisis cutting across countries with different social, economic and political characteristics and which yet - despite favouring cooperative solutions at the supranational level - has largely been met with initial responses of a national, even local, nature. So, how well did the EU perform as a crisis manager in the pandemic crisis?

This book will be of key interest to scholars, students and readers of crisis, pandemic and health management, European Union politics and governance.

chapter |12 pages

Introduction

COVID-19 and the European Union – is this time really for bad?

chapter 1|16 pages

A crisis beyond the crisis

chapter 6|21 pages

Constitutionalising the state of exception

Implications for citizenship

chapter |11 pages

Conclusion

The EU as a crisis manager in the pandemic – good but not great