The State, public responses and the day after the pandemic
Daniel Chávez1
International media coverage and most academic analyses have thus far focused on the magnitude of the COVID-19 pandemic in wealthy northern societies, particularly in European countries. However, references to the European reality obscure profound differences in how the crisis is affecting various countries and social sectors. This article analyzes public sector responses in the European context (with an emphasis on the socio-economic dimension) and suggests some lessons that could be relevant or useful for Latin America and other regions of the world.
Lesson 1 – Protecting the working and vulnerable population
A guiding principle of free-market economics is the privatization of profits and the socialization of losses. However, in the context of the current pandemic, even the most fundamentalist libertarians are demanding stricter market regulations and a more active role for the state. In most countries of the world (with the likely exception of North Korea, and only to a certain extent), the national economy is structured around three basic components: household consumption, government spending, and private sector investment. In “normal” times, household spending and private investment ensure economic growth, but in times of crisis—regardless of its origin—even the most ardent defenders of free markets demand that the public sector protect them.
This logic became evident during the global financial crisis of the last decade: around the world, and particularly in wealthy northern countries, during the Great Recession of 2007 and 2008, the state intervened to bail out the financial sector and other struggling sectors. In some countries, the government provided direct cash transfers to households and increased public investment to compensate for the decline in private sector activity in crucial areas of the economy. Even so, for many governments, the priority was rescuing the banks. According to data compiled by researchers at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), between 2007 and 2017, direct public support for financial institutions in 37 countries totaled $1.6 trillion ($3.5 trillion if guarantees are included!). But how many resources were allocated to protecting working people and low-income households?
A crucial difference between the crisis generated by the pandemic and previous crises is that the problems now lack an economic basis. In this context, temporary subsidies for those who remain employed, such as those envisioned in plans drawn up by the governments of several industrialized countries (for example, in the bill currently under discussion in the US Senate, which includes financial transfers of up to $1200 for most of the adult population), would not be very effective. People will not stop shopping due to a lack of money, but because social distancing and quarantine measures will prevent them from going out, and the expansion of e-commerce will not compensate for the decline in traditional retail activity. Financial support for those who need it remains extremely important, but monetary support must be redirected toward those who are losing their jobs and not, or at least not primarily, toward those with long-term job security.
The working population most at risk of unemployment should also receive support. A basic assumption of the measures being implemented to contain the pandemic is that in all sectors where working from home is possible, people will continue to perform their regular tasks and responsibilities as usual. But job insecurity is spreading as rapidly as the virus, and presenteeism—resulting from employer pressure or financial incentives for people to come to work even when they are sick—is becoming another difficult problem to contain. It is vital, then, that those employed in essential sectors, where working from home is not viable, do not contract or spread the virus, with new measures guaranteeing job or income stability, which are threatened by the pandemic. Even the British government, conservative and very close to the business sector, has decided that the state will provide subsidies equivalent to up to 80% of salary if companies do not reduce their payroll during the recession caused by the pandemic. These payments will have a maximum value of 2500 pounds per month (2800 dollars), just above the average income.
In Europe, the virus has found fertile ground for its rapid spread among broad sectors of the population already severely affected by the austerity policies of previous years. The measures implemented by the European Commission (EC), the European Central Bank (ECB), the IMF, and conservative governments have expanded the social stratum of the precariat, which is highly vulnerable to COVID-19 and similar threats. This new European precariat includes millions of homeless people and beneficiaries of public or NGO food aid programs. A survey published last year by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) revealed that only a third of the German population and a quarter of the Italian and French populations had any money left over at the end of each month for discretionary spending. At the same time, part-time or zero-hour employment contracts have expanded enormously, undermining the finances of millions of households.
In the words of a British researcher, “the millions of workers trapped in poverty are more likely to have insecure jobs, with fewer labor rights and benefits, and with less savings to cover unexpected costs or temporary gaps in their income.” Therefore, it is crucial that governments take all possible measures to reduce both the financial strain and the increased anxiety caused by the growing job insecurity resulting from the pandemic. Some possible measures to protect these workers would be: (a) the introduction of job guarantee schemes, which would ensure resources to cover basic needs in the event of unemployment or reduced income, providing coverage to those affected by factory closures due to the drop in production during the health crisis, employees in the retail sector, the self-employed, artists, and small business owners; and (b) restructuring casual employment in the so-called gig economy with the introduction of new measures that require employers to provide paid sick leave benefits and treat all workers as salaried employees and not as independent contractors.
As other researchers have already explained, in the context of a pandemic, “the real economy needs support in the form of debt relief, environmentally sustainable public works, free higher education, and socialized healthcare.” In recent days, several European governments have taken concrete steps in this direction. Among others, the following are examples, with reference to a few countries.
- BelgiumMore than one million workers have already been placed on temporary unemployment. During the first month, laid-off workers will receive an advance of 1450 euros (1572 dollars) while their claims are processed. The Flanders regional government will support the workers on temporary unemployment by paying their energy bills.
- DenmarkThe government will offer financial assistance to self-employed workers and students, as well as compensation for fixed expenses such as rent and easier access to state-guaranteed loans.
- CroatiaThe government will control and limit market prices for 28 basic household consumption items, including flour, eggs, sugar, cooking oil, meat, fish, medicines, and sanitary products.
- France: Payment of taxes, social security contributions and water, electricity, gas and rent bills is suspended.
- ItalyRetroactive to February 23, a 60-day moratorium will protect workers from dismissal for objective reasons, preventing companies from cutting staff under the pretext of economic hardship. A bonus of €600 will also be granted to those who have lost their jobs due to the pandemic, and for a period of two months, paid leave for people with disabilities and those responsible for the care of dependent family members will be extended from three to fifteen days per month. Furthermore, mothers and fathers with children up to 12 years old will be able to request up to 15 days of parental leave with compensation equivalent to 50% of their salary.
- PortugalParents who need to stay home to care for children during school closures will be guaranteed 66% of their salary.
- SpainMortgages and utility bills (electricity and water) for people without a regular income will be subject to a moratorium. Employees temporarily out of work will receive unemployment insurance without their benefit period counting against their entitlement. Self-employed workers will not have to pay taxes if their income decreases during the pandemic. A dedicated contingency fund will cover the needs of the elderly, the homeless, and those in care homes and nursing homes. Public spending rules will also be relaxed so that local governments can use their surplus if they invest it in social programs.
On the other hand, while all occupations are important in times of crisis, the particular context of this pandemic in Europe has brought to a renewed appreciation for the urgent need for public service. Public health workers—in all areas: medicine, nursing, cleaning, and so on—are literally risking their lives caring for the sick, but there are other sectors—for example, the police, firefighters, teachers, and other education professionals—who are also working under extraordinary conditions. A new social ritual in European cities is the applause for healthcare workers at dusk, but public employees need more than just applause; they also need the reversal of the budget cuts that are hindering their work in hospitals, schools, and other essential services.
Lesson 2 – Investing in public infrastructure to face the next epidemic
The rapid global spread of COVID-19 was not a surprise to many epidemiologists and other public health specialists who had been warning for several years about the risks of a pandemic. If European countries had invested in the physical and social capacities necessary to face crises of this kind, the region would have been much better prepared to control the transmission of the virus.
Some of the hardest-hit European countries are precisely those that suffered the worst cuts to public spending as part of the austerity measures implemented across the Eurozone during the series of financial crises of the past decade. The current state of the Italian healthcare system is a prime example of what a team of researchers has termed “death by austerity.” Even countries that had developed strong and highly admired public health structures, such as the UK’s National Health Service (NHS), are being overwhelmed by the current surge of patients. First in Italy, and now rapidly in Spain and Britain, healthcare facilities are beginning to collapse under the massive influx of patients. After a decade of austerity imposed by Conservative governments, the NHS now has fewer hospital beds, doctors, and nurses per capita than the average for industrialized countries, and—as is already happening in Italy—British intensive care physicians are being forced to make the agonizing decision of who lives and who dies.
But austerity has also affected European countries in other ways that further diminish their capacity to combat the pandemic. In many countries across the region, municipal and regional authorities have suffered brutal budget cuts that have undermined the response capabilities of police, fire, and ambulance services. And although right-wing governments have co-opted some of the discourse, proposals, and demands of progressive political parties and social movements in Europe, the recent measures announced throughout the region fall far short of compensating for the terrible erosion of social services and public health infrastructure caused by budget cuts over the past decade.
Lesson 3 – Eliminate the obsession with the public deficit, the level of debt and the fall in GDP
Long before the pandemic erupted, several economists and business analysts in Europe and other parts of the world had expressed serious concerns about the imminence of a new global economic and financial crisis, already clearly visible in the declines in productivity and tax revenues in several countries in the preceding months. But the impacts of COVID-19 on people's health and the economy have been so drastic and abrupt that most medium-term predictions are rapidly becoming obsolete. The IMF Managing Director has predicted that the global recession triggered by the pandemic will be as bad as, or even worse than, the 2008 financial crisis.
The physical distancing, isolation, and quarantine measures adopted by European governments to contain the pandemic have led to a massive collapse in demand for a vast array of products and services, with the exception of a shrinking list of essential supplies. This trend, both regionally and globally, is resulting in what economists call a “supply shock”—factory closures or reduced production capacity. Simultaneously, there is a “demand shock,” as consumer spending plummets.
Even highly orthodox economists and conservative politicians are beginning to recognize that this is an unprecedented emergency that demands coherent and sensible responses, and an abandonment of the usual obsession with the public deficit, profit margins, debt levels, and GDP growth. The financial crisis of 2007 and 2008 was terrible in both economic and social terms, but the effects of the pandemic on production, livelihoods, and jobs could be vastly worse. As the head of the UK's Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) put it: “This is not the time to be nitpicking about the usual concerns about public sector debt, as we are in a situation typical of wartime.” The Spanish Prime Minister has even called for the European Union to implement a “Marshall Plan” (like the one implemented after World War II) to combat the spread of the virus and its social consequences.
In the context of the pandemic, even economists' jargon seems inappropriate. The term "recession" generally refers to a decline in production and employment, but today the primary concern should not be the health of "the economy" (at least as orthodox economists understand it) but the health and lives of people. This perspective implies challenging the discourse (and actions) of economists, credit rating agencies, and government officials obsessed with containing debt or the fiscal deficit. What value does a AAA rating have for a national government when doctors in intensive care units must decide who receives a ventilator, who lives, and who dies?
Perhaps this is also the perfect moment to have a serious conversation about the true meaning of “degrowth,” or more specifically, “planned degrowth,” considering the possibility of governments facilitating a transition that is not harmful to the climate and people, instead of implementing massive “stimulus” programs that ultimately aim to secure profits for large transnational corporations. Proposing a more active role for the state should not be confused with tax reforms like those proposed by billionaires such as Bill Gates, nor with traditional Keynesian prescriptions for tackling recession based on cash transfers to encourage consumption or large public infrastructure projects to “revive the economy.” Attempts to revitalize commercial activity at the present time could worsen the spread of the virus, and in contexts of physical isolation and forced quarantines, encouraging consumption would be of dubious effectiveness in stimulating the economy.
Lesson 4 – Reclaiming ownership and public management is a great idea
The calls for more active and forceful state intervention are becoming increasingly intense and urgent, as the economic, social, and political impacts of the pandemic grow more dramatic with each passing day, already worse than anything experienced since the last major global crisis of the past decade. It is not surprising that European governments have been quick to come to the rescue of the private sector: in the United Kingdom, the government announced a £350.000 billion ($403.000 billion) package of loans and grants to help British businesses during the pandemic. In France, the state treasury will disburse €300.000 billion ($325.000 billion) to private companies to prevent bankruptcies. Similar measures have been implemented by other European governments. But at the same time, calls for the recovery of the public sector have also intensified.
In mid-March, the news that the Spanish government had “nationalized” all the country’s hospitals and health centers made front-page headlines in newspapers across Europe. The media coverage was somewhat exaggerated, as there was no change in ownership, and the measure simply placed all private healthcare providers under government control. Even so, the Spanish decision foreshadows more radical measures that will very likely be taken by other governments in the near future.
The shift towards greater public control was to be expected from the Spanish government, a center-left coalition of social democrats (Socialist Party, PSOE) and the new left (Unidas Podemos, UP). But even the staunchly conservative British government has announced its willingness to move in that direction. The Transport Minister announced that airlines, railway companies, and bus companies could be nationalized in the context of the pandemic, but also made it clear that the aim of the measure was to protect the private sector and guaranteed a return to private ownership once the crisis is over. It is worth remembering that many of these companies had been privatized during the neoliberal heyday of Thatcherism and that the government would likely enjoy more public support today if it were to reclaim public ownership. Furthermore, renationalization would make a great deal of sense from a purely economic standpoint, according to calculations by experts in the field.
The shift in the hegemonic discourse on state ownership in Europe was reflected in a passage from a recent editorial note by The Guardian, one of the most reputable newspapers in England:
We have moved into a different world, one that will require discipline to cope with quarantines over extended periods. In a democracy, confinement will have to be largely self-monitored and without curtailing civil rights. People have proven to be extraordinarily resilient. But individual strength, human kindness, and local solidarity cannot replace the tremendous national effort that will be necessary. Ultimately, Only the State can guarantee the scale of action required to ensure life, needs, and security at a level consistent with the effort of the entire population[The italics are mine.]
This could also be the opportune moment for a genuine nationalization of the financial sector, going beyond the temporary and limited measures implemented during the last global financial crisis. Supported by a growing body of empirical research on the benefits of public ownership, activists in several European countries have proposed the creation of public banks. Once again, as happened in the last major financial crisis, private banks will be asking for state bailouts, as they will become insolvent unless their operations are guaranteed by the government. A vast database of experiences from diverse parts of the world demonstrates that a different financial system—one that is publicly owned and managed, that diminishes the power of large corporations, and that serves the people and the planet—is indeed feasible.
Recent research by the Transnational Institute and partner organizations in various countries of the Global North and South shows that, in the last decade, there have been more than 1400 cases worldwide of the creation of new public enterprises or the return of privatized companies to state ownership (national, regional, or local). This trend has been tracked in 58 countries. Trade unions and other grassroots organizations have often led these processes, mobilized not only by improvements in their working conditions but also by offering their valuable practical knowledge and direct experience to improve the management of public services.
Lesson 5 – Don't forget the climate emergency
As the pandemic spread across the globe, one of the few widely shared pieces of good news on social media was the apparent positive impact of the crisis on environmental indicators. The drop in economic activity caused by measures to contain the spread of COVID-19 was leading to notable improvements, confirmed by satellite images from the European Space Agency showing a marked reduction in global levels of nitrogen dioxide in the atmosphere. According to a British researcher, “We are currently, in a way no one planned, in a global experiment on an unprecedented scale […] which allows us to appreciate possible future transformations if we transition to a low-carbon economy.” The data is indeed encouraging, but it will not be enough to reverse the climate catastrophe if the global economic order is not radically transformed once the pandemic is over.
On the other hand, all actions aimed at combating the climate emergency will help us be better prepared for the next pandemic. State interventions will be essential to prevent an outbreak of a pathogen similar to (or worse than) COVID-19. Public agencies must lead research in health and environmental sciences, not only by providing resources, but also by ensuring that all publicly funded research is publicly available.
Protecting the environment and preparing for the next pandemic must go hand in hand. For example, preventing deforestation can reduce biodiversity loss and decrease the risk of infectious diseases. The recent Ebola epidemic in West Africa has been linked to bats—the likely vector of the virus—and their increased proximity to human populations after their natural forest habitat disappeared when trees were cleared to expand palm plantations and produce oil for export to Asian and European markets.
The only way to stop or at least slow climate change is a drastic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions resulting from the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and gas). This requires a radical transformation of the energy system, based on electricity production from low-carbon sources such as wind and solar. Low-carbon generation would also decrease air pollutants that cause or exacerbate cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes, and premature deaths, which further strain our healthcare systems, as the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated. But the energy transition the world needs will not be delivered by the private sector, as a vast body of empirical evidence from around the globe shows that the market-driven approach to expanding renewable energy has failed and that the only viable path is public ownership. It is imperative to reverse the increasing privatization of the energy system, as is already happening in several parts of Europe.
As happened during the financial crisis a decade ago, the governments of wealthy northern countries will be quick to intervene to prop up the market and protect their transnational corporations. European (and US) governments have already announced bailout measures for airlines, oil companies, and other highly polluting corporations affected by the pandemic. The alternatives to these kinds of bailouts are very concrete:
In these situations, any government intervention must be geared toward the urgent transition to an economy and a type of society that are not dependent on fossil fuels. Companies that are to be bailed out or subsidized (especially oil companies, airlines, and the banks that finance them) must be subject to public control within the framework of an emergency climate transition plan. Once under public control, these companies should be liquidated or restructured within the framework of an environmentally sustainable industrial policy strategy that moves beyond the extractive model leading to climate catastrophe.
But recovering (or maintaining) public ownership is not enough. Democratizing the public sector is also necessary. European and Latin American experiences with state-owned enterprises demonstrate why the pre-neoliberal model of public ownership should not be idealized, as many of these companies were, or are, highly hierarchical and centralized, failing to allow users and workers any real participation or influence in how their services are managed and provided.
Lesson 6 – Trusting not only in the State: strengthening “the commons”
A very positive and beautiful “side effect” of the pandemic has been the proliferation of solidarity networks. In Europe and all other affected regions, in the context of physical distancing and quarantine measures implemented to control the pandemic, local communities have developed highly creative alternatives for mutual aid, despite the erosion of social bonds caused by four decades of neoliberal policies.
Self-managed solidarity networks are rapidly growing in coverage and scale as “horizontal and community-based mutual aid strategies that have spontaneously emerged to cooperate,” including the organization and production of “resource guides, webinars, virtual communication channels, online meetings, lending clubs, and other forms of peer collaboration both online and on the ground.”
These initiatives fall within the broad and flexible conceptual framework of “the commons” (the commons) and economic and social cooperation between peers (peer-to-peer, P2PIn essence, these ideas refer to the transition towards a system that allows responding to creativity and social needs based on viable alternatives to obsolete and centrally planned state systems and failed market economies, which would allow an evolution towards a more egalitarian, fairer and environmentally sustainable society.
In particular, the urgent need for mutual aid solutions, given the inability of both the market and the state to address the crisis, has mobilized the open-source community, one of the most dynamic social groups in the commons sphere. Italy, the European country hardest hit by COVID-19, has suffered a crippling shortage of hospital equipment; in response to the emergency, technically skilled “good Samaritans” have used their 3D printers to produce ventilator valves for free distribution.
A Canadian researcher has offered a highly poetic summary of the power of commons-driven alternatives:
Meanwhile, those in quarantine and semi-isolation are discovering and using digital tools as ways to assist and support those suffering in our communities. We are slowly reclaiming the powers of communal living that we thought were lost, those hidden in plain sight, our secret heritage. We are relearning how to become a cooperative species, shedding the old claustrophobic skin of homo economistThe capitalist order of competition, mistrust, and endless hustle and bustle lies dormant, and our ingenuity and compassion resurface like dolphins returning to the Venetian lagoon or birds returning to the open sky. smog[…] When spring arrives, the struggle will be to preserve, improve, establish new networks, and organize ingenuity and compassion to demand that the old normal not return and to resist the imposition of a new normal.
Lesson 7 – Let us prepare for very hard times and many losses of life
Although the number of infections recorded (so far) in Latin America is far lower than the terrible toll of those infected and killed in Europe, the region is at high risk of suffering enormous social and economic losses, including many lives that could be saved if governments and society react in time. But the speed and scale of the responses in Latin America have been much slower and more limited than in other regions of the Global South. In Africa, where several governments did not hesitate and immediately imposed severe restrictions on the movement of people, “the strong and timely reaction was not a product of political maturity, but the result of bitter experiences and the awareness that public health systems are already overburdened and cannot withstand another onslaught,” in the words of an African journalist. The 2014 Ebola epidemic is still fresh in the minds of those who suffered it firsthand, reminding them that prevention, containment, and a swift government response offer the only hope of avoiding thousands of deaths.
The observations about the foreseeable overload of hospitals in Africa are also relevant to Latin America. Compared to Europe—where hospitals are already collapsing under the sudden and enormous influx of patients requiring critical care—in Latin America, with weaker health systems and other significant factors—higher malnutrition and large urban agglomerations, including dozens of megacities with more than five million inhabitants and deficient water and sanitation supplies—the mortality rate could be much worse than in Europe. In many places, the basic recommendation to wash hands cannot be followed due to a lack of running water. The precautions taken in Europe to contain the pandemic are impossible for thousands of residents in the favelas of Rocinha, Tabajaras, and Providência in Rio de Janeiro, where the water service has just been cut off, for example, as expressed by one resident of a Rio favela, reflecting similar concerns in many other parts of Latin America:
The quarantine is highly selective. Those who can afford to stay home will be fine. But those of us who survive on a daily income will have to go out anyway, because we have to work to earn enough to eat. If there aren't federal public support programs aimed directly at the poor, when the virus reaches the favelas, people will fall ill like dominoes.
And economically, the pandemic could mean the beginning of an unprecedented recession in the region. Latin America emerged from the global financial crisis less affected than other regions of the world and for some years—between 2010 and 2015—even enjoyed a boom fueled by the growing demand for raw materials from China and other expanding economies. Latin American countries, rich in natural resources, were able to exhibit high rates of economic growth, and in most of them, poverty and inequality indicators decreased. But the so-called “cycle of commodities"It ended five years ago, and today, when resources are needed to confront the pandemic, the state coffers of many countries are almost empty, and there is no financial cushion to offer stimulus packages or the payment of unemployment insurance or temporary social benefits remotely comparable to those being implemented by European governments. The region was already experiencing stagnant economic growth and widespread political discontent since last year, long before the crisis hit."
However, the weaker position of Latin American countries in the global economy does not mean they are all defenseless against the pandemic. In fact, several Latin American countries still have relatively robust public health systems and structures akin to those of a welfare state. At first glance, compared to Europe, the region as a whole has far fewer hospital beds per 1000 people, an essential indicator for confronting the pandemic: just 2,2 compared to 5,6 in the countries of the European Union. But these figures could be misleading, since the Southern Cone countries (Uruguay, Argentina, and Chile), in particular, have stronger health systems than several Eastern European countries, according to comparable data. Yet even these supposedly better-prepared countries (to which Cuba could be added) exhibit much worse indicators of health spending and hospital infrastructure than Italy and Spain, two countries that are barely coping with this health crisis. And at least 10 countries (Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Paraguay, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Haiti, Honduras and Guatemala) lack both hospital capacity and other essential conditions to face the pandemic, even on a much smaller scale than Europe is experiencing.
Despite their limitations, even small and economically weak countries are taking emergency social measures to protect workers and vulnerable populations, comparable to those implemented by European countries, or even more advanced ones. The government of El Salvador, the smallest country in Central America, has suspended payments for electricity, water, telephone, and internet bills for three months, in addition to freezing mortgage and personal loan payments and increasing the salaries of healthcare workers.
Other Latin American nations are better positioned to combat the pandemic thanks to the resilience of their public companies. Countries like Uruguay and Costa Rica have strong and highly respected state-owned companies that provide world-class water, energy, and telecommunications services. In Uruguay, for example, the government announced that the state-owned company ALUR-ANCAP (responsible for oil refining and fuel distribution) will increase production of hand sanitizer to guarantee the national supply and prevent price gouging during the emergency. Also in Uruguay, scientists at the Molecular Biology Laboratory of the University of the Republic and the Pasteur Institute have developed a local procedure for identifying COVID-19, thus enabling the production and distribution of diagnostic systems that are cheaper and faster than those currently available. kits available (and increasingly scarce) on the international market. These examples show the importance of the public sector as a crucial instrument for confronting the pandemic.
After the pandemic…
This is the time to think about and prepare for a world that will be very different once the COVID-19 pandemic ends. As has already been correctly observed, “the think tanks Right-wing think tanks and defenders of capitalism have panicked, fearing that half a century of careful ideological work to convince us of the necessity of neoliberalism will end up in the trash in the coming weeks. This is the moment to discuss the real meaning and viability of “socialism,” “ecofeminism,” “nationalization,” “(re)municipalization,” “degrowth,” and “the commons,” among other ideas that have been the focus of often purely abstract debates among those of us committed to building a more just and democratic society.
Ecofeminist thinkers and activists had already warned us long before the start of this crisis that we needed to place much greater emphasis on the ethics and politics of care, recognizing social and ecological interdependencies as guiding principles for building a society that transcends capitalism. The revaluation of the ecofeminist perspective implies recognizing that it is impossible to conceive of humanity's future without considering our species' relationship with other living beings and with the planet as a whole, as has become evident when considering the conditions of the origin and spread of this pandemic.
Decades of privatization, both in Europe and in Latin America and other regions of the Global South, have weakened our public services and made it much harder to cope with crises like the current pandemic. We are now much more aware that those who work in hospitals, schools, and services for the elderly and disabled do so under immense stress and in highly precarious conditions. The pandemic has also shown us how our energy, food production, and transportation systems, which rely on patterns of perpetual extraction that would inevitably lead to the climate catastrophe already so evident in many parts of the world, need to be radically restructured. COVID-19 has already caused much suffering, but it also offers some valuable lessons that we cannot afford to ignore.
1- Senior Researcher at the Transnational Institute (Netherlands)Member of the CLACSO Working Group on States in Dispute.
[+] Thinking about the pandemic
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