The Fortress World: After the Pandemic, Which Future?
- Details
- Published on Thursday, 16 July 2020 03:52
- Written by editor
~~~~~~~~~~~(((( T h e B u l l e t ))))~~~~~~~~~~~
A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 2147 ... July 16, 2020
______________________________________________
The Fortress World: After the Pandemic, Which Future?
Shalmali Guttal
We were already on the way to variations of Fortress World before COVID-19: right-wing, authoritarian/fascist regimes have been able to capture political power riding on the immiseration, anxieties, and frustration resulting from global capitalism and corporate globalization, while progressive political-societal forces have been unable to unite resistance and create spaces for alternative systems to flourish.
COVID-19 has made visible the stark realities of inequality across the world. Class and social privilege, race/ethnicity, gender, occupation, and age determine who are most vulnerable to the virus and who suffer the worst impacts of the pandemic, including the economic, social, and political ramifications of the measures taken by many governments to contain the disease. While heredity is important, pre-existing health conditions of co-morbidity also exist caused and exacerbated by entrenched inequalities, which determine work conditions and environments, as well as access to good-quality healthcare, diet, and facilities to prevent disease -- e.g., regular water supply, sanitation, housing that allows physical distancing/quarantine, personal protective equipment (PPE), etc.
