Our post-pandemic
future
By Vanessa MacDonnell, Sophie Thériault and Sridhar Venkatapuram hat will our post-pandemic future look like? This is a question on the minds of many these days. Indeed, in the weeks and months ahead, politicians, policy experts, academics, businesses, non-profit organizations and the broader public will have to make important choices as we rebuild our lives, societies and the international order. Around the globe, governments at all levels are developing a range of recovery plans. Some of these plans will tilt toward austerity, tacitly accepting that some people can be left behind. Health care budgets may not see significant cuts, but other crucial public goods and services, such as education, could see their funding slashed. Alternatively, some governments will spend their way out of the economic downturn. These governments will invest significant funds to support businesses and their populations and build new infrastructure in the hope of stimulating the economy. These investments will take different forms. In Canada, for example, there continues to be pressure to bail out the oil and gas sector and to loosen environmental protection measures. But there are also calls to convert the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit, the $500 weekly payment to people who became unemployed as a result of the pandemic, into a universal basic income program. In short, whether through cutting back or spending more, governments will be faced with choices. And what COVID-19 has shown us all is that the choices governments make can have immediate life or death impacts.
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It is essential to acknowledge that the pandemic is the outcome of policy choices made by governments and not a natural disaster or an “act of God.” The fingerprints of governments and their choices are everywhere, whether at the international level in the regulation of animal-transmitted disease threats and outbreak reporting, the regulation of international trade and travel, or how quickly and what kind of policies were implemented to contain the virus. The devastating effects of COVID-19 are equally the result of choices: to tax and spend in ways that benefit some and disadvantage others; to intervene or not intervene in the economy when market forces prevent individuals from meeting basic needs; to view health as the product of a combination of luck and personal choices rather than the result of colliding social, economic and political factors; and to adopt particular foreign policies on international cooperation, including foreign aid. Defective government policies created the pre-conditions for the pandemic as well as the extent of the devastating outcomes. Choosing austerity as the path forward is just a continuation of bad choices and social injustice. Cutting back government programs and social common goods are likely to further entrench existing inequalities rather than strengthen the economy or protect us from future pandemics and health shocks. Slashing essential programs like education and incomes supports is more likely to create new vulnerabilities than to remedy old ones. Continued on page 19
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