Talking the talk or walking the walk? Communication and performance as drivers for citizen evaluation of local crisis management

In crises and disaster situations, governments are expected to take action. However, on a local level, administrative performance regarding crisis management varies. While an increasing number of research is focusing on how citizens perceive crisis management, the link to crisis management action is missing. This paper asks how local public performance and local crisis communication matter for citizen evaluations of crisis management. Theoretically, the paper draws on crisis management literature and literature on crisis communication and how they link to public perceptions. Empirically, the paper examines the Covid-19 crisis as a particular case of administrative action in Germany. The transboundary character and scope of the Covid-19 pandemic allow observing a considerable variation of local crisis management in terms of effectiveness and crisis communication efforts. Using a unique combination of data from a citizen survey of early public perceptions among German districts and survey data of local administrations in the corresponding districts, multilevel analysis is used to analyze the effects of crisis management performance and crisis communication on public evaluations.