COVID-19 and shrinking civic spaces: patterns and consequences
COVID-19 and shrinking civic spaces: patterns and consequences
复制标题
DOI：
10.1007/s42597-020-00038-w
复制
发表时间：
2020-10-02
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
Wolff J
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Bethke FS;Wolff J
为应对COVID-19疫情，全球大部分国家已对集会自由实施严格限制，甚至完全封锁，在许多情况下还对进一步的公民权利和政治权利实施限制。虽然限制措施被普遍认为是拯救生命和保护卫生保健系统免受过度负担的必要措施，但它们也带来了政府过度干预的风险，即政府可能利用大流行作为一个方便的机会和理由，出于政治目的实施限制措施。从这个意义上说，COVID-19可能会对自21世纪初以来一直在发展的全球趋势产生另一个重大推动作用：公民空间的缩小，其特征是政府针对公民社会行为者的限制增加，并限制他们的集会，结社和言论自由。本文件旨在评估为应对COVID-19疫情而实施的公民空间限制，以探讨其直接后果以及对一般公民社会组织，特别是有争议的公民活动的潜在中期影响。首先，我们从多个数据来源提供证据，说明COVID-19相关限制随时间和国家在全球的传播情况。其次，我们确定了工作中的关键动态，以评估这些限制的直接后果和潜在的中期影响。这些动态通过观察个别国家（包括柬埔寨、德国、匈牙利和黎巴嫩）的经验来说明。本文的在线版本（10.1007/s42597-020-00038-w）包含补充材料，可供授权用户使用。
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, a majority of countries worldwide have introduced severe limitations on the freedom of assembly, if not an outright lockdown, in many cases complemented by restrictions on further civil and political rights. Although restrictions were generally considered necessary to save lives and protect health care systems from overburdening, they also pose the risk of government overreach, that is, governments may use the pandemic as a convenient opportunity and justification to impose restrictions for political purposes. In this sense, COVID-19 may give yet another substantial boost to a global trend that has been unfolding since the early 2000s: the shrinking of civic spaces, which is characterized by an increase in government restrictions that target civil society actors and limit their freedoms of assembly, association, and expression. The aim of the paper is to assess civic space restrictions that have been imposed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic with a view to exploring their immediate consequences as well as their potential mid-term implications for civil society organizations in general and contentious civic activism in particular. We do so by, first, providing evidence from multiple data sources about the global spread of COVID-19-related restrictions over time and across countries. Second, we identify key dynamics at work in order to assess the immediate consequences and the potential mid-term implications of these restrictions. These dynamics are illustrated by looking at experiences from individual countries (including Cambodia, Germany, Hungary, and Lebanon). The online version of this article (10.1007/s42597-020-00038-w) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.