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01 June 2020

China's response to the Coronavirus pandemic

Professor Eva Pils on China’s response to the Coronavirus pandemic and its implications for constitutional law and human rights.

Image of a globe focusing on China

Professor Eva Pils has written for Verfassungsblog on China’s response to the Coronavirus pandemic and its implications for constitutional law and human rights. In her article, she writes that the Chinese government has fought not only the virus, but also - characteristically - critics of its response as enemies. The result of which has been numerous human rights violations that call the discourse of 'autocratic efficacy' in emergencies into question.

She writes; ‘From the perspective of the Chinese Communist Party… its handling of the pandemic has been a global model teaching us that China’s governance system is better suited to deal with crises than liberal democracies with their complex constraints on emergency powers…But the reality of China’s coronavirus experience raises distinctive legal-political concerns.’

Read the article in full on Verfassungsblog.

Eva Pils is Professor of Law at King’s where she currently teaches courses on human rights, authoritarianism and the law, and law and society in China. Before joining King’s in 2014, Eva was an Associate Professor at The Chinese University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law.