The COVID-19 Effect: What’s Next?
FOUR PREDICTIONS FOR OUR WORLD ORDER
According to the late psychic Sylvia Browne, the coronavirus was inevitable in 2020. Her 1981 book End of Days also suggests there will be no cure, but the virus will inexplicably and suddenly vanish only to reappear in 2030. Let’s see – we are over two months into our global pandemic, with more than 340,000 deaths and over five million people infected… sigh. But what else might be next?
Here are four predictions for our world order for the rest of this year and what to watch for in 2021:
1) Geopolitically, the coronavirus has reminded us that the traditional, US-led multilateral world order is definitely over. Look for a unique form of COVID-19 bilateralism to deepen.
Pre-COVID-19, we wasted a lot of time speculating about who’s in charge – is it the US and China or regional powers? This speculation continues. But the pandemic is a stark reminder that the post-Cold War era driven by US-led multilateralism is definitively over (at least until the 2020 US election – then we can reevaluate if needed). Yes, the G20 and G7 officials met virtually to discuss a unified response to our pandemic, a sentiment echoed by the UN and former world leaders; plus a number of countries (excluding the US) committed $8 billion for a vaccine. But we also see that a unique form of COVID-19 bilateralism is emerging to fill the leadership void globally. States are leveraging COVID-19 diplomacy to build new (or renew) strategic links. Despite a backlash, China has taken the global lead on sending medical support abroad, but others like Turkey, South Korea, India and Cuba have also stepped up their efforts. (We even see non-state actors like tech billionaires (e.g. Jack Ma, Adrian Cheng and Bill Gates) directly offering world leaders medical support). How will such COVID-19 bilateralism reshape geopolitics? The game changer could be if a country like China (or even a billionaire) creates a vaccine and then shares it (freely?) with all other countries.
What to watch for in 2021: could COVID-19 diplomacy – or vaccine nationalism – reshape our world order?
2) Politically, COVID-19 has given most governments a chance to regain legitimacy in the eyes of their citizens. But most leaders will fall short. Look for more anti-government protests.
Our pre-COVID-19 political struggle focused on the crisis of legitimacy in both democracies and nondemocracies. We saw tech-armed citizens challenging their leaders, political systems and government policies in unprecedented ways – 2019 was in this sense the year of the protester. This led to broader questions about whether democracy was necessarily the best system – or could there be something better? Well, the global pandemic has given governments a chance to regain legitimacy – many of us have hung on the words of our leaders during their televised press conferences, especially in the early weeks of the pandemic, desperately hoping they could save us. But the frustration with government has definitely resurfaced. Citizens have already protested lockdown measures in the UK, Germany, India, Iraq and elsewhere. But protests will grow as more citizens question governments’ COVID-19 policies, including those that are seen as undemocratic (e.g. how contact tracing infringes on individual rights). We already see some leaders using the pandemic as an opportunity to be more autocratic (e.g. Hungary’s Orban, Phillipines’ Duterte, the military in Myanmar) – this trend will persist. Criminal and terrorist groups (e.g. in places like Italy and Afghanistan) will keep taking advantage of the situation, while activist billionaires continue to fill the gap short-term with medically-focused support (e.g. in places like the US, Zimbabwe and Nigeria).
What to watch for in 2021: Could this steady rise in anti-government protest break down the social contract?
3) Economically, the virus has given governments (and international financial institutions) a chance to (re)gain legitimacy – this time through their relief packages. But many citizens will feel left behind. Look for a growing class of precariats to emerge in both developing and developed countries.
Pre-COVID-19, we were burdened with a major challenge to globalization from economic nationalism – and that continues. We also kept hearing from experts about how tech will wipe out so many of our jobs – 40% in the next 15 years which would create “more pain than happiness in the next 30 years”. Well, let’s face it, because of the pandemic, we are experiencing high levels of unemployment right now as we head into the “worst recession since the Great Depression”, according to the IMF. So it’s been fairly encouraging to see many governments offer massive relief packages to help the newly unemployed, small businesses and others. But many will sadly be (or feel) left behind, especially as not all jobs will return post-pandemic. This will likely create more “precariats” – a term coined by economist Guy Standing – which is a global class of people with “no occupational identity or narrative to give to their lives”. Some precariats may have already been left behind by globalization or the global youth unemployment crisis; some were on track to be jobless due to automation; and now some may be derailed by the pandemic. The psychological toll of unemployment and being left behind in a post-COVID-19-economy will obviously create more frustration.
What to watch for in 2021: Who will take care of the growing precariat class globally, if governments fall short?
4) Socially, the pandemic has in one sense united a fractured world. We all have one shared goal – we all want to live. But look for our existing global identity crisis to deepen further.
Our pre-COVID-19 struggle was rooted in this question: are we globalists or nationalists? At times, it felt as though we were being forced by certain policymakers and hate groups to pick a side, with no option to be both. This divisive sentiment sadly bled deeply into many societies: recall the actions of tech-savvy hate groups against many migrants and refugees in the US, Latin America and Europe, and against religious minorities in countries like Myanmar, Sri Lanka and India. But the pandemic has already deepened these existing societal strains and created new ones against the other – a trend which will sadly persist. Consider the recent coronavirus-related misinformation campaigns that led to attacks on Muslims in India and Rohingya refugees in Malaysia, the backlash against East Asians globally, the resurgence in anti-immigrant, xenophobic rhetoric from certain political parties in France, Germany and Spain, among others. Where is the much-needed public counter-narrative to such hate? Rhetoric from UN Secretary-General António Guterres to end such hate speech is important, but is hardly sufficient. World leaders are burdened with so many other aspects of this health crisis (and in some cases are part of the problem), it’s hard to see global or domestic leadership on this (though New Zealand’s Jacinda Arden comes to mind – remember her call for a global anti-racism fight after last year’s Christchurch attacks? Please, Jacinda, can you lead us now?) What is worth noting is how citizen movements are taking steps to unite our global community to promote more positive values. Consider the new One Shared World movement for global interdependence, nonprofit Global Citizen’s #TogetherAtHome and Global Goal: Unite for Our Future campaigns and even Hollywood actor John Krasinski’s Some Good News show. Whether such efforts can counter COVID-19-related hate longer term is another matter.
What to watch for in 2021: Who will minorities and other sensitive groups targeted by COVID-19 xenophobia turn to, if governments keep falling short?
And what about you, Reader – how will COVID-19 impact the rest of 2020? More importantly, how do you want things to evolve in 2021?
Prof Aziz wrote this blog while working remotely from London during the lockdown; her related book A GLOBAL SPRING: Predictions for a Post-Pandemic Worldlaunches in 2023. The prequel and 2020 edition of her award-winning, bestselling book FUTURE WORLD ORDER is on Amazon (15% of profits go to her brother’s memorial fund for Syrian refugee youth via charity Peace & Sport).
