Where do we go from here?

Last week as I was traveling, with my infant son to visit my family, when the Corona crisis caught us on our way. As it turns out the nice lady sitting next to us on the plane was diagnosed with Corona a few days later. So now we are in quarantine for 2 weeks, feeling a bit like a prisoner waiting to be sentenced.

Research shows that optimistic people live longer, and now that I need a good dose of health to boost my immune system and I have too much free time on my hands, I started reflecting on our current situation - Where does it lead to? Where do we go once we manage to weather the storm? And how can we squeeze a jar of lemonade out of these lemons? (coz you know, vitamin C!).

For the longest time we have seen ourselves as individuals, losing touch with our surrounding, we have become so accustomed to getting any random item from Amazon Prime within 24h, to eat Kiwi from New Zealand in the midst of the Danish winter, and catch a flight for a quick weekend in London or Berlin for the cost of a coffee & sandwich. We have been grinding down this path at the expense of environmental resources, knowing fully well the pollution and carbon emissions it causes, and the environmental and social injustice it creates as well as the growing inequality. We’ve ignored all the red alarms, sirens, and warning lights. The impact of our current (or should I already say former?) socio-economic structure was already surfacing in a form of growing nationalism, staggering social disenfranchisement, populist governments, looming climate change impacts, and such an obsession with growth that turned our economic activity to a plane flying off with no route or a landing plan.

Something had got to give, so something did.

As opposed to some environmentalists, I don’t rejoice over the current economic slow-down and the industrial-economic meltdown even though we now have reduced emissions and resource depletion. But at what price? The human tragedy of this crisis isn’t worth it, and moreover, this crisis alone will not solve things unless we fundamentally rethink the foundation of our social-economic life both in a local and global context.

Looking at things from another perspective

Personally, for the longest time, I was fearing we were heading towards a large scale war or an irreversible climate disaster, and as crazy as it may sound, the Coronavirus is probably the best-case scenario out of all the other possibilities. Of course, the price we pay is incredibly high in human life and lost livelihoods, however, this crisis has also managed to bring all humanity together against a common enemy. It has provided us with the clearest demonstration that we are all interconnected and dependent on each other, and that what happens to people in China or Iran can no longer be ignored, as it will for sure impact us too.

We are all in it together

Within weeks we have seen unprecedented international collaboration between scientists, the medical community and policymakers - information, knowledge, experience, and medicine is shared and shipped across the world in a global effort to save lives and stop the pandemic. Every small success and revelation gets celebrated and is immediately shared forward to colleagues worldwide. I don’t know about you, but I find that very exciting and touching.

We have also learned that borders are useless, not one single country can fight the battle alone. The challenge is too big and the world has become too small, protectionism can only be a solution for a very short period of time as we see now. There’s wide agreement that stopping people from moving around is impossible and in the mid-long run, only a global effort and collaboration can help protect us from the next waves of the pandemic. We are all stuck on this rock together and now have an opportunity to develop and practice good global governance of rules and procedures that will hopefully build a pathway for collaboration on other global challenges such as climate change, water crisis, etc.

We’re all better off when we’re all better off - Nick Hanauer, economist

The current crisis has also exposed that money and private insurance cannot shield you from the adversities of a public health crisis when a big portion of the population is left unprotected. In a society where people don’t take care of each other, the implications are grim for all. The understanding that human and economic wellbeing cannot be separated is starting to sink in even among the extremists within Trump’s administration. In a historic move, the USA federal government has promised free treatment for all, and even to cover for sick days for those who have to be quarantined. The topic of free healthcare for all is already dominating the upcoming presidential elections, and as the dust starts to settle on this crisis I believe people will be holding their leadership accountable, asking tough questions on decision-making and priorities of those who were willing to sacrifice public health for the sake of stock market stability and economic growth.

21st-century renaissance for science and facts

The past couple of years saw an increasing number of fake news, anti-scientific trends, and propaganda which spread thanks to the prevalence of social media in our lives. However, now in a time of real medical crisis, the voice of the various anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists has been silent, and in the rare cases they do appear here and there, they are being quickly shut and ridiculed. When put to the test, people are seeking medical and scientific facts and at large are capable of telling truth from lies. I truly hope this will serve as a lesson to take with us forward to never doubt science and truth, ever again.

New working styles

Within a matter of days, we have transcended from the 20th-century work culture to one that belongs to the 21st century. Once circumstances demanded it, people found great flexibility in allowing their employees to work from home and instantly leveraged digital technologies to substitute face-2-face interaction. And guess what? It’s worked like magic - people stayed at home close to their families and away from trouble, and yet, “shit is getting done”. What rationale will employers have to reverse that trend once the Corona wind blows over? Once people have tasted the benefit of remote work that reduces waste of time and money in traffic, parking, public transport commute in awful weather, and increases time with family and help to close the gender gap, it will be very difficult to go back to the previous 9-5 in the office pattern. I think we will move towards much more flexible arrangements that will also help us in the fight against these damn carbon emissions.

It takes a village to get over a pandemic and rebuild the economy

But what keeps me optimistic most these days is the human spirit and acts of solidarity all over the world. These are tough times for everyone, and yet it manages to bring out the best in people. Every day I see or hear about people offering their help in watching children of medical employees, sharing food with each other, volunteer to care and provide for the elderly, organizing online support groups, free concerts, and educational activities for the kids stuck at home, taking the extra mile to shop at a local business, singing to each other from their balconies to keep spirits up, and the list goes on and on. No matter how many social distancing measures are imposed by the governments it seems that we cannot keep away from each other, and despite the obvious short-term danger this makes me happy in the long-run.

The crisis is global but it is through building and maintaining strong local communities we will manage to get through it, and I think this is where the biggest opportunity is for change - we are currently pressing on the reset button on our social and economic patterns, let make sure this wasn’t all for nothing. I hope we learn from the hardships of today and focus on what brings us light and hope in times like these: our families, our friends, and communities. In the aftermath of this pandemic many businesses will be damaged or bankrupt altogether, and we will have to put our best thinking caps on to find a way to re-rebuild our economy and develop business innovation that will help us to leverage on what is unique and abundant in our surrounding both in terms of materials and human capital, and to find resilience in diversity and localism. It won’t be easy, but it will be the only way to rebuild our economies in a manner that will help to re-empower our communities and ensure that next time we face a challenge on such a global scale we are far less fragile in dealing with it. Balancing the re-emergence of strong local economies in the context of globalization and the growing need for international collaboration mentioned above will provide us with a great challenge, but one that I’m personally quite excited to start thinking about.

But for now, stay home, stay sane and stay safe!