Unmasking a health care system: the Dutch policy response to the Covid-19 crisis

Abstract

The Covid-19 pandemic has put policy systems to the test. In this paper, we unmask the institutionalized resilience of the Dutch health care system to pandemic crisis. Building on logics of crisis decision-making and on the notion of ‘tact’, we reveal how the Dutch government initially succeeded in orchestrating collective action through aligning public health purposes and installing socio-economic policies to soften societal impact. However, when the crisis evolved into a more enduring one, a more contested policy arena emerged in which decision-makers had a hard time composing and defending a united decision-making strategy. Measures have become increasingly debated on all policy levels as well as among experts, and conflicts are widely covered in the Dutch media. With the 2021 elections ahead, this means an additional test of the resilience of the Dutch socio-political and health care systems.