Understanding Chinese authoritative experts and their roles in China's COVID‐19 policy response process: A combined perspective of institutional and multiple‐streams framework

Abstract

This study is among the first to examine the defining characteristics of Chinese authoritative experts and their roles in crisis policy response by integrating both institutional and multiple‐streams framework. The study argues that the defining characteristics of authoritative experts in China include standing as role models for the public, being adaptively embedded into the policy‐making system, and usually engaging in policy process by becoming a member of a formal experts group. Authoritative experts can act as problem brokers in the problem stream, as policy advocates in the policy stream, and as legitimacy enhancers in politics stream, depending on the nature and dynamics of the crisis and the socio‐political context. The theoretical argument was based on and supported by empirical evidence from China's COVID‐19 policy response in the early stage.