COVID-19 is a public health crisis with great government, justice, and justice ramifications. This Thematic in practice scopes here some early considerations on what the international community supporting security reforms should know on the pandemic, informing their programming and thinking in the short run. This quickly transforming pandemic is redefining the global landscape, as we currently know. Healthcare providers are at the front position of response measures. Still, security agencies are involved in the core of managing a challenge that can change socio-cultural forces at work, relentlessly weaken the economy, have another look at global relations and redefine political values and the civil society and state’s role.
Typically, conflict risks are worsened by natural disasters. The condition of civilians could worsen, specifically displaced and migrant communities, who are already living with weak access to sanitary conditions and public services. The response of the government to the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a vibrant centralization of political decision-making. Disaster measures have been announced in most countries suffering from virus outbreaks, changing the executive authority’s reach of oversight purposes, specifically by the policymakers. Some observers in Qatar have been prophesying a potential swell in possible power abuse or autocratic rule, particularly in areas where accountability and oversight functions are not irrepressible enough. Maintaining compliance with fundamental liberties, Human Rights, and the Law Rule could pose a challenge in the future. The effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the economy, education, and the living conditions of many people in Qatar is anticipated to raise actual, and viewpoints of inequity, resulting in social unrest and discontent in the country, specifically in areas where socioeconomic setup is too weak as far as absorbing the consequences is concerned. The figure below shows an emergency framework for security agencies in Qatar in the response of COVID-19.
Emergency Framework for Security Agencies in Qatar
According to Van Bavel et al. (2020), lawyers, judiciary, border guards, civil protection agents, police agents, and armed forces in Qatar face events that need to perform beyond their mandates while risking their lives concerning contracting the coronavirus. This will, in turn, strain systems that are already under-resourced and under-capacitated. The government assistance to security agencies reforms in Qatar is currently being faced with a defining moment for helping them in reforms and making significant responses to the pandemic that has wreaked havoc across the globe.
Paul et al. (2020) assert that governance reforms and accountability are currently being required more than ever. Security agencies are in direct contact with society not just in intruding into civilians’ lives but also in enforcing the measures that have been put into place by the healthcare sector. The pandemic is expected to re-establish human security in front of other concerns in Qatar. The efficiency, relevance, and effectiveness of security agencies will currently be perceived from a human security viewpoint at the expense of other measures. The border control authorities, armed forces, and police officers face new challenges that require to be addressed without considering the absence of ready-made resolutions. The lessening will make this issue complex of available capacity because of the COVID-19 pandemic in the country. The disruption of the education system might have a significant effect on the increase in crime rates. Incidents in human trafficking, black market deals, severe and organized crimes, gender-based violence, among other crimes, will need to be given extra attention and response.
Currently, security agencies in Qatar are acting beyond their mandates in sustaining their work during this pandemic. On top of that, armed forces are experiencing an increase in a public health crisis that changes how services are rendered to the community, especially when it comes to the criminal justice system that poses a challenge concerning their commitment to efficiency and transparency (Gronvall, 2020). Their vibrant capacities in medical support, logistics, and crisis management have been directed to the pandemic’s response measures. As a result, it is essential to improve community policing in the mission of averting cases of misunderstanding or abuse of powers between the involved parties.
The effect of overcrowded correctional facilities, insufficient respect of human rights, and insufficient access to healthcare is challenging the efficiency of the criminal justice system in Qatar. The challenge might create a chance of scoping other measures of rehabilitation. As the country might be paying attention to the future regarding the pandemic’s response and increasing capacity concerning managing the consequences, people could increasingly seek services to justice providers and non-state security, such as private security firms. The current society’s safety necessities, together with broader effects of the rule of law, penal reform consequences, national emergencies, and law enforcement challenges, reforms are significantly required in the justice and security sector to secure Qatar in due course.
References
Gronvall, G. K. (2020). The scientific response to COVID-19 and lessons for security. Survival, 62(3), 77-92.
Paul, E., Brown, G. W., & Ridde, V. (2020). COVID-19: time for paradigm shift in the nexus between local, national and global health. BMJ global health, 5(4), e002622.
Van Bavel, J. J., Baicker, K., Boggio, P. S., Capraro, V., Cichocka, A., Cikara, M., … & Willer, R. (2020). Using social and behavioural science to support COVID-19 pandemic response. Nature human behaviour, 4(5), 460-471.
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