Did National Cultures Determine How Nations Are Dealing With The Covid-19 Pandemic?
“The central conservative truth is that it is culture, not politics, that determines the success of a society.” Daniel Patrick Moynihan
There is a growing international debate about the increasingly authoritarian methods to which some nations have resorted to deal with the Covid-19 Pandemic. The Libertarians have voiced their concerns. Scenes of angry protests by citizens are now becoming more frequent in national news media as citizens react to ‘self-isolation’ laws and regulations that come perilously close to government-imposed house arrest.
Governments everywhere are struggling to justify the imposition of harsh regulations and at the same time find gentler ways to manage the pandemic and save their economies from collapsing, On the surface, it seems that authoritarian regimes are more successful. But a recent article on the different Swedish solution caught my attention.
“Individual Freedom Works for Disease Mitigation, says the World Health Organization”
The proof offered was a release from s the World Health Organisation Health Emergency Program championing the softer model adopted by Sweden. “To recap: the Swedish government, judging its country to be sufficiently different from others and on advice of their surprisingly competent public servants, opted for less restrictive tools in fighting this disease. Sweden did not do nothing. The chief epidemiologist of the Public Health Agency, Anders Tegnell, has repeatedly stressed that Sweden follows the same strategy everyone else does: reduce the transmission of the disease; flatten the curve; expand hospital capacity; protect vulnerable groups.”
Why does the Swedish government judge “its country to be sufficiently different from others”? The question sent me to find a 2006 New York Times article by David Brooks, entitled The Culture of Nations, in which the author revealed some interesting statistics on parking tickets.
“Diplomats in New York rack up a lot of unpaid parking tickets, but not all rack them up at the same rates. According to the economists Raymond Fisman and Edward Miguel, diplomats from countries that rank high on the Transparency International corruption index pile up huge numbers of unpaid tickets, whereas diplomats from countries that rank low on the index barely get any at all.
Between 1997 and 2002, the U.N. Mission of Kuwait picked up 246 parking violations per diplomat. Diplomats from Egypt, Chad, Sudan, Mozambique, Pakistan, Ethiopia and Syria also committed huge numbers of violations. Meanwhile, not a single parking violation by a Swedish diplomat was recorded. Nor were there any by diplomats from Denmark, Japan, Israel, Norway or Canada.
The reason there are such wide variations in ticket rates is that human beings are not merely products of economics. The diplomats paid no cost for parking illegally, thanks to diplomatic immunity. But human beings are also shaped by cultural and moral norms. If you’re Swedish and you have a chance to pull up in front of a fire hydrant, you still don’t do it. You’re Swedish. That’s who you are.”
Now here is a true-true Trini story that goes back about five years. I was in a line at a teller station of a local financial institution. The street was visible from where we all were. Someone in the line drew our attention to the infamous wrecker driving off with a vehicle in tow.
The customer standing in front of me, erupted. “Oh Gawd dat is my car” and hurried out of the building urged on by the other customers in line to “Go Quick’.
What happened next was instructive. An energetic discussion started. Everyone who spoke expressed sympathy for the driver. A few who had obviously parked illegally also hurried out of the line. Many blamed the city authorities for not providing free parking spaces for drivers. Not one voice suggested that the driver should have observed the no parking regulations.
Was it because to paraphrase David Brooks, ‘If I am Trini and I have a chance to pull up in front of a fire hydrant, I do it. I am Trini. That’s who we are.’
Fast forward to some of the media stories that highlight our Trinbagonian 2020 response to the temporary Covid-19 Pandemic self-isolation and safe-distance regulations. Police are breaking up Covid-19 parties. Very unhappy drivers are protesting roadblocks. Owners have been arrested and charged for opening their bars. Our only consolation is that some of the international news is a lot more disturbing since it reveals bigger and more militant protests and incidents of police brutality.
Lloyd Best and Terrence Farrell both described our culture as being ‘irresponsible and unresponsible’. Farrell has put the responsibility for change on our irresponsible leaders. Best, on the other hand, suggested that the responsibility rests on our “validating elites”, but without specifying who comprised this somewhat nebulous group. Friends keep asking me who are these “validating elites”.
On the other hand, young calypso guru Helon Francis suggested in his 2018 Calypso Monarch presentation that -
“Things won’t change despite what WE say,
If change doesn’t start with YOU.”
He sang these words pointing his finger directly at a full savannah grandstand audience and indirectly at those of us glued to our television screens at home. Note carefully the juxtaposition of WE and YOU. The YOU he addressed was ‘All Ah WE', the citizens of Trinidad and Tobago. And WE applauded. WE commented. Some of us exclaimed ‘YUH preach boy’. But like all the other leaders and ‘wannabe’ authority figures, he did not imply nor accept that the change should start with ME. He ordered US to change. The capitalisation is my linguistic attention device.
Two years later we are still waiting for Best’s “validating elites” to solve our problems. But could it be, that the real “VALIDATING ELITES” are the medical staff on the frontlines of the pandemic battles at great risk to their own lives; the teachers scrambling to learn new technologies to ensure our students continue their education in the lockdown; the parents and guardians who have willingly accepted the extra duties of homeschooling while working from home; the family members protecting senior citizens who are more at risk; the police and security forces maintaining law and order; the government and its technocrats who are continually gathering the data, monitoring developments and adapting action plans, as well as all the truly essential workers in supermarkets, farms and everywhere else, who are keeping our society functioning, by accepting the personal challenge that If It’s To Be IT’S UP TO ME.
Going forward after Covid-19, will we use this teaching and learning experience to cultivate the self-belief and trust that the national culture of our Trinidad and Tobago could be transformed to become like Sweden’s “sufficiently different from others”.
What will it take?
Daniel Patrick Moynihan also said
“The central liberal truth is that politics can change a culture and save it from itself.”
In the meanwhile, the world is taking notice of little T&T. Check this Newsday report of May 1, 2020.
“Trinidad and Tobago now tops Oxford covid19 tracker”
“Trinidad and Tobago is now listed at number one in an updated covid19 lockdown rollback checklist compiled by Oxford University researchers.
The report, the Oxford Covid19 Government Response Tracker (OxCGRT), was created by the University of Oxford's Blavatnik School of Government (BSG).”
Read the full quoted stories online;-
https://newsday.co.tt/2020/05/01/trinidad-and-tobago-now-tops-oxford-covid19-tracker/
Head of Communications, People Strategy and Support
4 年Excellent discourse Kelvin. Thanks for sharing this ??.