It has been more than a year since it started, and despite the introduction of a vaccine, we still don’t know how the pandemic will develop.But this uncertainty can actually be a reason for hope
This is an article in the third issue of New Economics Magazine.You can read the full question here
As the British economy reopened after a long winter, people’s emotions seemed to divide into two camps. On the side, According to reports, business confidence is soaring, The market sentiment was boosted by the prospect of returning to normal. On the other hand are those who think that getting back to normal is the last thing we need. The worst-case scenario is a catastrophic third wave and another blockade.The best case is ‘The business-as-usual recovery wasted the opportunity for fundamental change.
This split is reflected within the Labour Party, although leader Keir Starmer promised to bring ‘unity’-looks more divided than ever.The party’s right-wingers are relieved that the long nightmare of Corbinism is over, and ‘Normal politics can be restored. People on the left are watching this spectacle with increasing despair, worrying that the fundamental change they hope for is being thrown into the dustbin of history when it is most urgently needed.
However, these two positions have some strange things. They all have a certainty, a kind of confidence in what the past has told us and what the future will bring, while our actual situation at this time is full of great uncertainty and turbulence. I think back to last spring, when most people expected the pandemic to be contained within a few months.On the one hand, this led to an absurd prediction ‘Facts have proved that the “V-shaped recovery” is a complete fantasy. On the other hand, it has caused many activists to burn out, believing that this is a critical moment of the crisis, and change will win or fail.
During this period, I worked with a famous congressman who insisted that his post-pandemic economic project must be delivered within three months because the window of opportunity for change will close soon. In his opinion, there is no time for in-depth organization and participation: the demand is too urgent. More than a year later, we are still at the center of the global storm.
If nothing else, this experience will certainly teach us to question our assumptions about what we are going through, what will happen next, and how we should respond. There is still huge uncertainty about how the pandemic will evolve and its long-term economic and political impact. Of course, this uncertainty is very worrying: it is a major part of the emotional loss caused by the pandemic, which can make us prone to exhaustion, exhaustion, and despair. But this is also the basis of hope.
After 2017, the British left has renewed confidence — increasingly believing that it is on the right side of history and that its ideas are winning controversy. By 2019, this has begun to ossify into arrogance. The despair that many people feel now is the mirror image of this hope, falling to the earth in pain.But Rebecca Solnit in her book Hope in the dark, Encourage us to embrace a different and more challenging hope. As she said: “Hope lies in the premise that we don’t know what will happen, and there is a space for action in the vast space of uncertainty. “This collective traumatic experience may bring about positive changes: we just don’t know. I want to provide three reasons for the second hope.
“Even if politicians want to go ‘Back to normal’, the tectonic plates of the economy may be changing under their feet in some way, which makes this simply impossible”
Solnit said that political and legal changes are often really just. ‘Approve deeper changes-culture, economy, knowledge. These transformations themselves are often achieved through the patience and firm organization of those who have never seen the fruits of their labor. In other words, the current position of the official opposition is far from the only factor determining the future direction of British politics. In fact, the direction of influence may eventually be the opposite. There is evidence that the pandemic may be accelerating these deeper changes.
First, cultural changes. This pandemic has brought collectivist values to the fore in a way that has never been done before in my life. The political leaders wisely declared, ‘Until all of us are safe, none of us will be safe. The explosive growth in the scale and scope of mutual assistance shows that our survival instinct is to help each other when we have to. Of course, those who participated in mutual assistance before the pandemic already knew this – but recent events have made this understanding broader. At the same time, the gap between what we value most-our health, our family, our friends-and our economic value has become very obvious. We now know who is the real one. ‘The basic workers are, and people do not notice that their wages are the lowest. The late David Graber put it best: “if ‘‘Economy’ means anything, it’s the way we provide each other with what we need to live (in any sense)”.
More importantly, we no longer just know this, we feel it. We experienced it directly and deeply, and in a way that imprinted it on all of us. For the adult generation during the pandemic, these experiences will be formative. Who knows what they will continue to do when it is their turn to take charge? Who knows how these subtle changes will affect our culture and our self-awareness?The financial crisis and its narrative ‘Greedy bankers and 1% (if any) reinforce the existing narrative of selfish individualism. But after that, these narratives will also control our collective imagination, which seems very incredible.
Second, economic transformation.Even if politicians want to go ‘“Return to normal”, the tectonic plates of the economy may be shifting under their feet in some way, which makes this impossible. The most obvious example is the city center. All the evidence shows that office work and commercial street retail will never It’s the same. The shift to remote work and online shopping is already happening: the pandemic has just accelerated them. This means that in a city like Manchester, where I live, the extractive industry-led development model may no longer be viable. Downtown business Real estate giants are struggling; new developments are questionable; large chain stores are closed for the first time in years More than a small independent store.
Of course, these changes have both negative and positive effects, depending on how to manage them.This is still the case. Overall, the pandemic is Increase inequalityBut it also profoundly subverts old work, shopping, and life patterns—the long-term effects of these changes are highly unpredictable.It is possible, and even very possible, that they will fundamentally reshape the economic geography of the United Kingdom—rebalancing activities far away from London, changing the relationship between cities, towns and suburbs, and favoring thriving local communities rather than ‘The main street of Clone Town. This future is far from guaranteed, but this is precisely the point: what we are doing now is very important.
Finally, intelligence changes. In October 2020, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) formally recommended that governments continue to spend in response to the crisis-prompting British “Financial Times” announced “The last nail in the coffin of austerity doctrine.” It’s hard to overstate the importance of this. Yes, this government will still try to use the crisis to reduce the size of the country—the wage freeze in the public sector shows this to us. Yes, the Labour Party does not seem to have received the memo and is still paralyzed by fear of being seen as profligate. But this is not 2010. They are all bucking the trend and become the last bastion of the notorious intellectual status, This status has been publicly denied by the institutions that support it.
On the other hand, Joe Biden understands the memo very well. His 2 trillion dollar stimulus plan and call for the lowest global corporate tax show that we are entering a new world. This is what the paradigm shift looks like. Does this mean that we are heading to a sun-drenched highland? Do not. Does this mean things can get better? Absolutely. Would this happen without the actions behind Jeremy Corbin and Bernie Sanders? We will never know-this is Solnit’s point of view. But if we try to imagine an alternative universe where these movements never existed-where the new thinking and organization that thrived around them never happened, ‘“Socialism” is still a dirty word—it’s hard to believe that this world will be exactly the same as the world we live in. In terms of its value, the Financial Times believes that both Corbin and Sanders contribute “Swing the political pendulum to support more active state intervention in the economy”.
“…Now is not the time to be tough. Now is the time to open up”
Yes, of course this is not enough. We not only need more state intervention in the economy-we also need more fundamental changes in ownership and power. But looking around today’s world, I found no reason for despair of certainty. I have no reason to believe that this kind of deeper change is impossible. In any case, Solnit believes that if our success criterion is utopia, we will always be disappointed. She suggested that we look for change in the wrong place. We are looking for the moment we win, we can point to and say: this is the moment we repair the damage. For classical Marxists, it was a revolution. For those involved in the Corbin and Sanders movement, this is an election victory. But the real world is not so dualistic. Even if these events happen, many challenges will lie ahead.Indeed, this is the core argument made by Joe Guinan and I In our book Regarding Corbyn’s prospects for leading the government.
Solnit reminds us that change is not linear, the world is not straightforward, and we can never truly understand the impact of our actions. As Tony Benn famously said, “There is no final victory, because there is no final defeat. He went on to say, “There is the same battle. Fight again and again. So be strong, damn strong. “This is where he and I parted ways. When I looked at the great suffering of the world and the people I care about, I thought: No. Now is not the time to be tough. Now is the time to open up our hearts-let us be together Trauma opens our hearts to each other, let our common uncertainty open our hearts to the possibilities of the ever-changing world. Then take action with hope and determination to help build a better future.
Christine Berry is a Freelance writer and researcher Headquartered in Manchester. She is currently writing a book on democratic ownership, which will be published with Verso in 2022.
