Capacidades institucionales de los gobiernos subnacionales en periodos de crisis: el caso del departamento de Santander en Colombia, 2020-2022

Abstract

The periods of recurring crisis that countries have gone through in the world reveal strengths and great weaknesses in the capacities that institutions have to face them. This article presents the results of the research on the response of the government authorities of the department of Santander in Colombia to the health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, in order to show the degrees of multilevel articulation, the effectiveness and ways of government leadership in contingency situations. The field work used the Institutional Capacity Analysis System (SADCI) methodology, which allows the study of disruptive phenomena, whose institutional response capacity to face them involves both the administrative and political factors, and implies analysis of multidimensionality and integration. of policies. To do this, it reviews the multi-level institutional flexibility, the ability to adapt and reinvent itself to respond to this type of situation that questions the foundations of the state and its governments, as well as their capacities to respond promptly and adequately to citizen demands. The results show that, in predominantly presidential systems such as Colombia, the central role of institutional response is concentrated in the head of state and his cabinet, and thus, the degree of response to crises at the subnational level is directly related to the level of autonomy that their governments have, innovation in the midst of difficulties and the types of leadership exercised by their leaders, especially in smaller municipalities.