Accounting for variation in IO crisis responses: focality and temporality

This article examines the varied impact of transnational crises on the governance capacities of international organizations (IOs). Most scholarship assumes that crises work either as a constraint or as an opportunity for IOs. However, the example of the COVID-19 pandemic illustrates that governance opportunities and constraints vary both across and within IOs over time. Integrating insights from global governance complexity and crisis studies, we develop a theoretical framework to account for these variations. We draw attention to both IOs’ relative positioning vis-à-vis each other and crisis temporality. In the age of IOs’ politicization amidst geopolitical tensions, we argue that focal IOs are likely subjected to heightened contestation during the initial “fast-burning” phase of a crisis, reducing their ability to act. In contrast, non-focal IOs, operating under less political scrutiny, may use their leeway to expand their activities and address urgent governance needs. As a crisis transitions to the “slow-burning” phase, focal IOs tend to regain agency, while non-focal IOs scale back their extraordinary activities. Providing comparative insights on WHO, NATO, and the WFP during the pandemic, we highlight the critical, yet underappreciated, role of non-focal IOs in ensuring governance continuity and challenge binary narratives about crisis effects on multilateralism.