Replication Data for: Diffusion by Leadership: The WHO’s Mechanism to Promote Policies Against Covid-19

In the early months of 2020, governments faced the rapid spread of Covid-19. In the storm of conflicting information about the danger posed by this new disease, countries sought guidance about when and how to respond to it. This paper argues that the World Health Organization (WHO) played a central role in the diffusion of policies against Covid-19 by exercising leadership. We develop the concept of leadership as a diffusion mechanism to explain how the WHO influenced governments to close schools, close workplaces, and cancel public events within weeks despite its lack of strong enforcement mechanisms. Results from five event history models show the significance of the WHO’s pandemic declaration on March 11 which mobilized countries to adopt the measures recommended by the organization. Conversely, that declaration did not affect the diffusion of policies which the WHO advised against adopting.