Italy's digital Covid certificate, known nationally as the 'Green Pass,' was enforced through unusual restrictions for a liberal democracy, as part of the government's effort to bolster the Covid-19 vaccination campaign. Since July 2021, the Green Pass provided the main authorizing tool for the public to access a wide spectrum of social spaces and activities, from leisure to public transport and from education to workplaces. The Green Pass therefore served as a normative technology, and triggered intense political controversy and heated debates in the Italian public discourse. In constructing claims about the Green Pass, advocates and critics alike co-produced normative arguments with understandings of scientific evidence. Notably, they articulated competing framings around: conceptions of freedom during a pandemic; what should be considered as 'evidence that matters' regarding the effectiveness of Covid-19 vaccines; value-laden projections of vaccination as either a solidaristic practice or an act of self-protection; the proper relationship between the state and its citizens; and the most appropriate modes of public health intervention. Accordingly, Italy's Green Pass offers a revealing case study for probing the implications of a normative technology with respect to public health effectiveness and the safeguarding of individual and social rights. It also provides an opportunity for scrutinizing the (re-)structuring of scientific and public health governance in a major Western democracy during a public health crisis.
The Italian debate on the digital COVID certificate: co-producing epistemic and normative rationalities / L. Marelli. - In: SCIENCE AS CULTURE. - ISSN 0950-5431. - (2023), pp. 1-30. [10.1080/09505431.2023.2211761]
The Italian debate on the digital COVID certificate: co-producing epistemic and normative rationalities
L. Marelli
2023
Abstract
Italy's digital Covid certificate, known nationally as the 'Green Pass,' was enforced through unusual restrictions for a liberal democracy, as part of the government's effort to bolster the Covid-19 vaccination campaign. Since July 2021, the Green Pass provided the main authorizing tool for the public to access a wide spectrum of social spaces and activities, from leisure to public transport and from education to workplaces. The Green Pass therefore served as a normative technology, and triggered intense political controversy and heated debates in the Italian public discourse. In constructing claims about the Green Pass, advocates and critics alike co-produced normative arguments with understandings of scientific evidence. Notably, they articulated competing framings around: conceptions of freedom during a pandemic; what should be considered as 'evidence that matters' regarding the effectiveness of Covid-19 vaccines; value-laden projections of vaccination as either a solidaristic practice or an act of self-protection; the proper relationship between the state and its citizens; and the most appropriate modes of public health intervention. Accordingly, Italy's Green Pass offers a revealing case study for probing the implications of a normative technology with respect to public health effectiveness and the safeguarding of individual and social rights. It also provides an opportunity for scrutinizing the (re-)structuring of scientific and public health governance in a major Western democracy during a public health crisis.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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