The effectiveness of the authorities’ activities at the local level in the COVID-19 pandemic (the experience of Russia and China)

The qualitative changes caused by the COVID-19 pandemic at all levels of the organization of the world community (individual, group, national, global) have actually formed a new social reality. Moreover, this process was of a force majeure nature; it took place in the conditions of a sharp increase in the uncertainty feeling, changes in the lifestyle of almost every person and every particular family, the unpreparedness of world medicine for an adequate response to the global epidemiological challenge, as well as the inevitability of large-scale problems in the economy and politics. The current conditions have become a challenge for the existing systems of public administration. The governments of different countries had to act quickly and decisively in order, on the one hand, to keep the development of the epidemiological situation under control, and on the other hand, to prevent a sharp deterioration of social stability against the background of objectively emerging epidemiological, social and psychological challenges. While the world medicine was urgently accelerating the development of a vaccine against coronavirus infection, the scientific and political community discussed the general strategy for implementing quarantine restrictions. However, against this background, the local community level remained virtually behind the scenes, which, nevertheless, was and still remains the most practical in terms of interaction of population with the authorities. It is at the local level (meaning the regional level, as well as the level of local selfgovernment) that the authorities are more close to the society problems, have the opportunity to interact face-to-face with its representatives, and the population, in turn, can actually participate in activities to improve living conditions (including solving problems caused by the pandemic). The article presents the experience of Russia and China in organizing interaction and evaluating the activities of local authorities by the population. Both countries have shown high efficiency in overcoming the crisis in 2020-2021, so their experience is of considerable interest, primarily in practical terms. The authors of the study have concluded about the importance of public assessment regarding the effectiveness of the activities of local authorities, as well as the prospects for actively involving citizens in solving problems arising against the background of force majeure.