Introduction

In “Governance, democracy and ethics in crisis-decision-making: The pandemic and beyond” edited by Caroline Redhead and Melanie Smallman, we consider what it means to be in a decision-making situation whereby rational or epistemic framings of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a focus on data and scientific ways of knowing the world, rub up against more entangled human experiences and existences. How can (or should) we re-focus our perspectives and our systems as a result? Looking at matters ranging from the authority of the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the power of data during an emergency, to the role of public engagement as a source of policy evidence, we reflect on what it means to govern ethically in a pandemic, and whether (and how) the expected standards and norms of public life, evidence and decision-making apply in such circumstances. We also reflect on how power, authority, trust and the sense of the ending of the pandemic are inextricably linked, creating a need for ethics to move beyond normative assertions of the law and regulations, whether in hospitals or in the halls of parliamentary power.