- December 08, 2020
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- July 16, 2025
On December 8, 2020, Aspen Germany hosted the fifth event of its series “Virtual Road to the Laboratories of Democracy Initiative” to discuss leadership in times of crisis. With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, our world faces a time of crisis unparalleled in most of our lifetimes. In times of global crisis, good leadership is essential in finding an adequate response and society looks to its leaders for guidance. In that sense, the current COVID-19 situation is a true test of leadership. In a conversation with the experienced Aspen Leadership Seminar moderator Ruth Girardet, the German and American state legislators discussed what constitutes good crisis leadership. What are the attributes of good crisis leadership and how do we assess them? What have been leadership challenges you had to face during the current global health crisis and other situations? What lessons can be learned through it? How can leaders find the right balance between the constitutional right to life and physical integrity as an absolute priority and other fundamental rights, such as personal and occupational freedom? How can short-term emergency measures be weighed against the long-term consequences of such decisions?
This webinar series is part of the “Laboratories of Democracy Initiative” which brings together German and American state legislators to facilitate a values-based discussion and an exchange of ideas about how to tackle current international policy challenges on a subnational level. In 2020 due to COVID-19, Aspen Germany holds a series of webinars as part of a “Virtual Road to the Laboratories of Democracy Initiative” providing a virtual platform for exchange for the 2020 cohort. The webinar series explores subnational governance in the United States and Germany amid COVID-19, leadership in times of crisis, the role of tech in the COVID-19 response, and prospects for German-American cooperation. The project is supported by the Transatlantic Program of the Federal Republic of Germany, funded by the European Recovery Program (ERP) of the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy (BMWi).
