Giovanni Agostinis
The COVID-19 pandemic presented significant challenges to global health governance, revealing institutional weaknesses and vulnerabilities to political disputes. In response, regional institutions took the lead in areas such as Africa and Latin America, filling the gaps left by global health organizations. Technically oriented regional health entities, like the Caribbean Public Health Agency and the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, employed indirect governance strategies to manage the crisis effectively. They orchestrated efforts to mobilize state and non-state actors with necessary resources for vaccine access and medical equipment, while also promoting the adoption of global best practices among member states. This facilitated a convergence of regional and global health responses, strengthening the regional-global governance nexus.
This research project aims to illuminate the role of regional institutions in global health governance, focusing on their actions in addressing transnational health emergencies like Dengue, Ebola, ZIKA, and COVID-19. By analyzing indirect governance initiatives in Africa, Central America, and the Caribbean, the project explores orchestration strategies and their impact on global health. It offers three key contributions: first, it enhances understanding of transnational orchestration by non-state actors, adding to the literature on indirect governance in international relations. Second, it advances global health scholarship by identifying the conditions that foster a stronger regional-global governance nexus. Finally, it contributes to comparative regionalism by examining the agency of technically oriented regional institutions in addressing transnational challenges in regions with limited state capacity.