Effectiveness of government responses and the role of national culture in addressing the COVID-19 pandemic : a global perspective

The colossal proportion of the COVID-19 disaster, with approximately 213 million confirmed cumulative cases and 4.5 million deaths at the end of August 2021, is of historical significance that is unparalleled. The pandemic has had an impact on the physical, mental and economic welfare of human beings in every corner of the world. To contain the crisis, governments have implemented a set of policies, aimed at directing human behaviour and improving healthcare outcomes almost from the outset, with varying levels of success. The battle against the virus continues. This study utilises data on growth in daily COVID-19 confirmed cases, from 56 countries which were most affected by the pandemic and investigates the effectiveness of several policies implemented by governments. The investigation covers the period, 24 January 2020 to 25 June 2021. The policies analysed in detail constitute 13 containment and health measures, incorporated in the Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker. The research is based on the premise that the contexts in which policies are implemented have a bearing on the outcomes. The contexts are classified under economic status, national culture, the level of human development and population density. We find that these contexts are relevant in determining the success of alternative policy prescriptions. Overall, the containment and health measures are effective in curtailing the growth in COVID-19 cases to varying degrees across all economic contexts of countries. Containment measures are least effective in lower-middle income countries. Three of the six dimensions of Hofstede’s national culture classifications tend to be positively associated with infection rates and the other three negatively associated. Moreover, national culture has a more prominent impact on the effectiveness of actions to reduce the growth in COVID-19 cases in lower-middle income countries. It is important to improve effectiveness of government policy responses to combat the pandemic by tailoring them to country-specific contexts. Our findings contribute to this customisation.