SOLIDARITY IN CORONA TIMES

When risk and uncertainty affect the wealthy, quality of life of the most vulnerable people may be neglected. 

Due to the spread of COVID-19, we are now instructed by our national health agencies to stay at home. Working from home and online is becoming the new norm. Global businesses are looking for creative ways to safeguard continuity without the ability to travel. In some countries, like Spain, but also Peru, Guatemala, and even India, a state of siege has been declared, with a curfew and a prohibition of gathering. Social distancing is required, and significant parts of the global economy are coming to a standstill.

In wealthy countries like here in The Netherlands, information and health systems are in excellent shape. We all know by now about herd immunity strategies and the challenge of how to flatten the epidemic curve in order to avoid a total collapse of the medical support system. Our country can mobilize up to 2500 Intensive Care Units (ICUs), which means 14.7 ICUs per 100,000 inhabitants. 

Most of the countries in which Solidaridad works face more challenging realities. In comparison: countries like Bangladesh or Zambia only have respectively 0.7 and 0.15 Intensive Care Units per 100,000 inhabitants available. Even more discrepancy is to be found in the availability of economic support packages. Our country and also our neighbouring countries are lining up funds in high speed to ensure that business can go on, and, in the unfortunate case it cannot, buffers are made available to ensure companies don’t get busted. There is salary support to all employees and even independent contractors that are currently without or with less work. The European Central Bank released a large emergency fund of € 1100 billion to ensure liquidity is being pumped around the EU-27 economy. Mrs Lagarde, President of the ECB, stated: ‘there are no limits in our support to overcome the COVID-19 pandemic’. 

The actions of the rich countries are in stark contrast to the harsh realities of poor countries. They cannot offer adequate safety nets. Workers in the informal economy do not have the luxury of staying at home with paid sick leave. People living in or near poverty often lack disposable cash and cannot easily stockpile food. Hunger, malnutrition, pneumonia and other forms of health-related shocks and stresses compound vulnerability to the virus and contribute to a vicious cycle of disease, destitution and death. Poverty can fuel contagion, but contagion can also create or deepen impoverishment. The virus will be another source of impoverishment and reinforce existing factors, in turn limiting the ability of vulnerable households to escape from - and stay out of - poverty. 

If you are in poverty, it can be a daily struggle to find bread, rice and drinking water. A struggle also to find work that gives a decent income, to ensure your children can go to school. The International Labour  Organization ILO has calculated that 1.2 billion people work in vulnerable employment conditions and at least 1 billion work in the informal economy. On top, the globe is populated with 400 million peasant families representing 1.7 billion people with little options to overcome any kind of crisis. In sum, for half of the global population corona can turn into a severe threat with potentially dramatic outcomes. It is that same half to whom globalization didn’t bring the prosperity as they might have hoped for.

Is this the new solidarity our European leaders ask from their citizens? A solidarity that focuses on flattening the curve, but at tremendous economic costs. With the loss of economic prosperity in low and middle-income countries at stake, the lockdowns to contain corona in the wealthy countries is an imminent threat to the poor. It remains to be seen if the lives saved with this approach will weigh out the lives lost as a result of increased poverty. 

The pandemic forces us to look critically at the current globalized extractive economy in combination with rapid population growth. Global private-sector supply chains have become very effective. As a result, the private sector is constantly moving around the world. Air travel is comprehensive and never-ending, spreading the virus at the speed of light. But coordinated governmental response is weak and disorganized - whether on climate change, wealth distribution, poverty alleviation, or health. 

Corona urges us to rethink globalization. The pandemic will spur the trend to re-localize the economy again. Automation, robotization, mechanization, the internet of things, 3D-prints as part of industry 4.0, and artificial intelligence will bring production closer to home again. In partnership with Threefold, Solidaridad works to even bring the internet itself back to decentralized solutions. 

The pandemic is already leading to a temporary lowering of greenhouse gas emissions. But destroying the global economy is not a long term solution to the climate crisis. Technology transfer and large investments are key, and will maintain the need for global solutions.

A new balance between globalization and localization - ‘glocality’ - is needed to ensure that technology transfer and investments from the global community are smartly matched with the re-emergence of, what I would call, a democratic economy. The starting point here is community wealth creation, creating opportunities and jobs for those long excluded.  Such an economy must be based on reclaimed pillars of sustainability. In which workers are valued as the most precious capital; natural resources are being maintained regeneratively, and food & health systems are becoming circular again.  

The extractive economy moves wealth and goods across the globe, away from where it matters. The democratic economy internalizes solidarity from the notion of place. We care about where we belong, where we live, where we have our land, family and jobs. We need to build community wealth that stays local by using global achievements. And, as a bonus, glocality can help to mitigate pandemics.