Legal and regulatory responses

Abstract

Covid-19 pandemic posed a unique challenge to legislatures and executives worldwide, necessitating the development of new regulations. This chapter evaluates South Africa’s legal and regulatory response to Covid-19 against the values enshrined in section 1 of the Constitution. It considers the options for managing the pandemic provided by the Constitution and ordinary legislation and evaluates the impact of the choice of the Disaster Management Act. Covid-19 has had a profound impact on and challenged the maintenance of human rights. The chapter reviews issues around human rights and governance within the legal framework, as well as the ethical guidelines that should frame responses to a pandemic. It examines how consideration of the country’s constitutional and democratic norms, values, and safeguards (e.g., the rule of law, freedom of expression, and human dignity) were affected with respect to the right to healthcare, education, a safe environment, and the like during the management of the pandemic. Rather than analysing specific regulations in detail, the chapter focuses on three macro issues: the rule of law, human rights, and freedom of expression. The aim is to provide a broad framework and set out principles with which the law must comply during emergency situations.