Can the West learn from China’s coronavirus response?

Crisis control is easier without democracy, but should we consider replicating China’s methods?

Dealing with an epidemic under conditions of authoritarianism is a completely different ball game — or game of chess, as Xi Jinping would say — to coping with the same threat in a democratic system.

In a surveillance state with the capacity to monitor select sections of society for the sake of ‘stability maintenance’, tracing and isolating individuals who have contracted an infectious disease is far easier than in a democracy which places a high value on personal privacy.

Authoritarianism: A form of governance where ultimate authority is in the hands of a small elite group. This authority allows the government to make decisions without consulting the broader population over which it rules. One method of consultation could be, for example, democratic elections.

That is not to say, however, that the two types of system haven’t faced similar issues in combating the new coronavirus.

For example, the central-local miscommunication that prompted widespread international criticism of China (see article below) proved also to be Italy’s undoing. Communication broke down between the central government and hospitals in northern Italy over testing protocols, allowing citizens to quietly spread the virus without oversight for weeks.

However, without China’s mass-surveillance infrastructure — invasive as it is — the Italian authorities were less able to respond effectively to the new breakout, allowing carriers to travel in and out the country with few restrictions.

Almost every movement a Chinese citizen makes is logged and traceable. From train and plane tickets, which can only be bought with an ID card, to metro tickets and taxi rides, paid for via mobile apps which, again, require formal ID, even travelling by private car in China means being having your license plate photographed routinely throughout the journey.

Within the European Union, however, citizens can travel invisibly across national borders and between major cities. Bank transactions are, for the most part, confidential, and only international flights require the presentation of formal ID.

While Italy proudly cut transport links with China, its own citizens had been quietly spreading the virus across the country’s north and Europe more broadly.

Read the full article here, via Medium:

Photos courtesy of local government officials in Foshan and Shunde, Guangdong Province.