The pandemic raises two questions about international cooperation, whether it is desirable and/or feasible. We can see political action to fight the pandemic as a classical “public good”, a case where cooperation is needed but may fail to materialize. If this is really the case, the definition can be used to force individuals to comply, in terms of “enlightened self-interest”. Other grounds in the history of political ideas refer to morality or personal consent, both of which are more difficult to apply. Similar arguments can be used to defend a delegation of authority to an international organization like the EU or the WHO, but will national governments delegate authority? There are three mechanisms by which delegation (“integration”) already takes place: political bargaining, rivalry over perceptions and pathdependent evolution. Some of this could be under way, but is hard to observe. A reflection on the questions discussed is that there is a tension in the underlying assumptions about the reasonableness of individual rationality, norms and democratic accountability.