THE coronavirus pandemic has gone hand-in-hand with considerable democratic backsliding. According to a new study, democratic freedoms were undermined in 83 countries from March to September 2020. This should concern all of us. Oversight and accountability during the COVID-19 pandemic are essential for both the public and democratic health of a nation. Nic Cheeseman/ Rebecca Gordon We set out to explore the role that legislatures played in responding to COVID-19. In particular, we looked at how they scrutinised governments’ actions. Legislatures are central to modern democratic politics. But they are often bypassed during moments of crisis as Presidents and Prime Ministers prioritise a rapid response. This is true for both established democracies and new democracies in which political institutions are still strengthening. COVID-19 has raised particular challenges for legislatures. For example, social distancing requirements have made it harder for them to sit as usual. On the other hand, the longevity of the crisis has created more time for legislative scrutiny. To investigate, a group of researchers developed the “Legislative Responses to COVID-19 Tracker”. We also conducted case studies on the legislatures’ response in Brazil, Nepal and Ukraine. The tracker monitored legislative responses to COVID-19 for 65 countries. The report shows that, between March 1  and June 1 2020, the innovative use of technology played a key role in enabling 52% of legislatures to sit regularly, and 35% to sit irregularly. However, almost a third of legislatures had no direct oversight over the government’s initial response from March 1 to May 1 2020. This is important, because effective legislative scrutiny helped to constrain unnecessarily heavy-handed approaches in some cases. In others it prompted the government to take action where it had been slow to respond. Legislative responses There are two different — though not mutually exclusive — explanations for the differences in the extent of legislative oversight. One is the pre-existing strength of democratic institutions. The other is the disruptive impact of the pandemic in low technology legislatures. In most cases, lower scores on our tracker reflected lower legislative effectiveness scores prior to the pandemic. One example of this was in Algeria. Similarly, countries with higher tracker scores generally featured higher levels of scrutiny pre-pandemic, such as Belgium and Botswana. But this was not always the case. Despite low parliamentary effectiveness scores pre-pandemic, the Democratic Republic of Congo’s legislature voted on multiple extensions of the state of emergency and set up a COVID-19 commission. This created opportunities to monitor the government’s response. On the other hand, there were also cases where the pandemic significantly disrupted pre-existing practices because legislatures lacked the capacity to meet virtually, or were prohibited from doing so. Nepal is one example. The country is usually rated as having mid-level legislative effectiveness. But a provision