Communicating the COVID-19 Crisis: A Comparative Analysis

Televised speeches by politicians have rarely gained as much attention as in spring 2020: citizens around the globe attentively followed government announcements about the COVID-19 outbreack and its countermeasures, which eventually resulted in an (almost) world-wide lockdown. For example, the Austrian governments press conference on March 13, 2020, reached a market share of 69 % and is one of the Top 10 TV events of 2020, along with the Vienna Opera Ball and several ski races. The global occurrence and high frequency of these press conferences present an unprecedented opportunity for the comparative analysis of political crisis communication. For one, in democratic countries, governments and heads of state rarely get allocated as much live airtime as in the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. For another, never before have such live speeches taken place in as many countries at the same time. In this context, the project seeks to answer two research questions: (1) Which strategies of crisis communication did governments and heads of state choose in the immediate phase of the COVID-19 crisis? (2) Which factors influence the crisis communication strategies of governments and heads of state? We analyze videos of speeches and press conferences that were broadcast live between February and summer 2020. We include 17 OECD countries in our analysis, ranging from Austria and Germany to Iceland, Sweden, South Korea and New Zealand. Using quantitative and qualitative social research methods, we will explain how and how often governments and heads of state held press conferences during the pandemic, which contents they conveyed, and which factors influenced these settings. At the end of the project, we will gain new insights in to the political dimensions of the COVID-19 crisis from a comparative perspective, and we will contribute to a better overall understanding of political crisis communication.