Political legitimacy and vaccine hesitancy: Disability support workers in Australia

IF 5.7 1区社会学 Q1 POLITICAL SCIENCE

Policy and Society Pub Date : 2023-01-10 DOI:10.1093/polsoc/puac030

H. Dickinson, A. Kavanagh, S. Dimov, M. Shields, A. McAllister

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引用次数: 2

Abstract

People with disability are an at-risk group in the COVID-19 pandemic for a range of clinical and socioeconomic reasons. In recognition of this, Australians with disability and those who work with them were prioritized in access to vaccination, but the vaccination targets were not met. In this paper, we analyze qualitative data generated from a survey with 368 disability support workers to identify drivers of COVID-19 vaccination hesitancy and why the implementation of this policy may have experienced challenges. We identify a range of themes within these data but ultimately argue that a major driver of vaccine hesitancy in this group is a mistrust of government and an erosion of employment terms and conditions. Drawing on the policy capacity literature, we argue that the “Achilles’ heel” for the Australian government in this case is the critical policy capacity of political legitimacy. This finding has important implications for where the government needs to increase/build policy capacity, strengthening its efforts and better relating to organizations that can be helpful in terms of developing public health messaging for disability support workers.

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政治合法性和疫苗犹豫:澳大利亚的残疾支助工作者

由于一系列临床和社会经济原因，残疾人是2019冠状病毒病大流行的高危群体。认识到这一点，澳大利亚残疾人和与他们一起工作的人优先获得疫苗接种，但疫苗接种目标没有实现。在本文中，我们分析了从对368名残疾支持工作者的调查中产生的定性数据，以确定COVID-19疫苗接种犹豫的驱动因素以及该政策的实施可能遇到挑战的原因。我们在这些数据中确定了一系列主题，但最终认为，这一群体对疫苗犹豫不决的主要驱动因素是对政府的不信任和对就业条款和条件的侵蚀。根据政策能力文献，我们认为澳大利亚政府在这种情况下的“阿喀琉斯之踵”是政治合法性的关键政策能力。这一发现对政府需要在哪些方面加强/建设政策能力、加强努力以及更好地与那些有助于为残疾支助工作者提供公共卫生信息的组织建立联系具有重要意义。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Policy and Society Multiple-

CiteScore

18.00

自引率

6.50%

发文量

审稿时长

30 weeks

期刊介绍： Policy and Society is a prominent international open-access journal publishing peer-reviewed research on critical issues in policy theory and practice across local, national, and international levels. The journal seeks to comprehend the origin, functioning, and implications of policies within broader political, social, and economic contexts. It publishes themed issues regularly and, starting in 2023, will also feature non-themed individual submissions.