The Role of Expert Networks in Pandemic Governance and Recovery

The COVID-19 pandemic era witnessed an intense competition for knowledge, which was essentially a contest over whose knowledge becomes authoritative. In this article, we focus on the role of expert networks in contesting the official pandemic policy. We study specifically an expert network in Finland, consisting of researchers from different disciplines ranging from law to economics and medicine. What makes the case so intriguing is that the network’s communicating style was affectively charged and alarmist, setting it apart from traditional expert language that is articulated in a style that aims towards neutrality and objectivity. Similar networks were formed across the world under the loose umbrella term ‘Zero Covid’ during the intensive pandemic years 2020 to 2022. Our aim is to increase knowledge on the role of such spontaneous networks during a health crisis that is characterised by epistemic instability. The pandemic era was particularly conducive to the formation of such networks, but they have been less active in the recovery phase. We argue that these networks were energised by the epistemic void in the intensive phase of the pandemic but lost their impetus in the recovery phase, which has been characterised by more robust knowledge and a less acute sense of threat. We employ frame analysis to identify two dominant frames – the national battle frame and the urgency frame – that the Finnish network used in public communication. We also briefly review its public reception to illustrate how the network managed to generate authority in the pandemic era. Finally, we discuss the tricky nature of policy advice by scientists who are urged to step into the political sphere to offer their advice to politicians but, as a result, can be labelled as political actors rather than as scientific experts.