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| Emerging trends of nationalism and Covid -19 | | |
Dr. Rajkumar Singh
Automation technologies have been widely used in high-value industries such as automation in auto mobiles. In other sectors, adoption of automation has been slower. But this is about to change, driven by the combined forces of Covid-19 and nationalism. Covid-19 and nationalism have a multiplying effect in reducing the available workforce. Covid-19 achieves this through stay-at-home orders and physical distancing restrictions which make it impossible for businesses to operate at capacity. Nationalism does it through policy and an unwelcoming narrative that reduces the flow of migrant workers across borders to meet seasonal demand. Business owners are rightly concerned. Without employees, their operations will cease to exist. Hoping for a change to the political landscape seems like folly. Whilst political trends ebb and flow, there is little indication that we will quickly move back to a more liberal, globalized outlook. In fact, Covid-19 has increased the likelihood that we will move more towards a nationalist, protectionist agenda, with a current focus on the repatriation of critical industries and securing supply chains. This somewhat bleak picture poses an existential challenge for many companies that rely on large numbers of people. If they cannot secure staff, they will either file for bankruptcy or be forced to find an alternative.
Global status of protectionism
It is the beauty of our vibrant, dynamic economy that we continue to adapt and respond to the challenges we are presented with. The current situation is no different. Technology companies and more traditional ones will increasingly work together to build our homes and offices, to secure our food supply, to produce the goods we need, and much more. This is something we should rightly celebrate. It makes rapid recovery from the pandemic far more likely that at any time in history. However, at this juncture policymakers must carefully monitor the impact of this technology on the labor market. Today, it is clearly welcome. Tomorrow, we may be creating an economy without sufficient jobs for those who need them or be reversing important gains in areas such as diversity and inclusion. That is a much wider debate, but one we must not lose sight of even in these most challenging of times. Today, it is undeniable that the coronavirus crisis has brought globalism to its knees. As British economist Philippe Legrain argued, "It may deal a blow to fragmented international supply chains, reduce the hypermobility of global business travelers, and provide political fodder for nationalists who favour greater protectionism and immigration control." And it looks like the effects will be long-lasting, undoing years of multilateralism. From the European Union struggling to find a minimum common denominator to support its southern region to the US halting exports of protective masks to Canada, countries are turning inward, away from openness and often from solidarity, too.
Negligence of Governments
However, after seeing many wealthy nations failing to contain the virus, the truth might lie on the opposite side of the field. The little molecule keeping billions of people in lockdown is showcasing the need for increased global governance and cooperation, with impetus not seen since the horrors of the Second World War. The daunting experiences that most citizens of the world have been going through in the last months - from the loss of loved ones and material deprivation to mental health strains - are in no way imputable to an excess of global cooperation. Those sufferings come from the inability of governments to collaborate, share information, data, and best practices, and learn from each other. As a global problem encompassing oceans and continents, the idea that a pandemic is considered to be a country-specific problem is one of the most short-sighted considerations that world leaders have drawn. On the one hand, there is China, who delayed the spread of information to protect its regime, and as a result, ended up wasting precious days of preparation for the rest of the world. On the other hand, most countries looked the other way once they had all the information needed to take quick and effective measures. Despite international warnings and the first case on its soil dating back to January, the US only started performing Coronavirus testing at the end of February. Instead of pulling their resources together to face the virus and follow the World Health Organization (WHO) guidance, countries ignored the problem until it was inside their houses.
Governments that refused to look beyond their borders lost precious days, and sometimes even weeks, of preparation time that could have saved countless lives, alleviated suffering and put an earlier end to this crisis. And it is not like evidence wasn't there. Italy has been one of the worst-hit countries in the world. Yet, even when images of army trucks transporting bodies out of northern Italian towns went viral across the globe, most of its neighbours did not take action to contain the spread of the virus until much later, knowlingly putting hundreds of thousands of lives at risk. France had even asked its citizens to go to the polls for local elections, 24 hours before enacting its lockdown.
Overlooking of global institutions
In the phase of pandemic, cooperation fell apart. Instead of having intergovernmental bodies leading the charge, institutions were dragged into geopolitical bickering. President Trump publicly lashed out at the WHO on Twitter, alleging its favouritism toward China. The EU struggled to keep it together, incapable of showing united leadership to maximise the speed of its response; the debate that divided the block for weeks was whether or not to issue much-needed financial support in the form of joint debt to the struggling South. These dynamics gave a leeway to extreme nationalists around the world. Consider Hungary's Orban who has used this as an opportunity to take unlimited powers to “deal with the crisis” or Brazil's Bolsonaro who has kept denying that coronavirus is even a threat. Supranational institutions' lack of power did not provide a counterbalance to populists' hostility toward globalism.
It is in times of great adversity that the need to fight for a better future arises and becomes more potent than ever. Out of the First World War came the League of Nations. The advent of the Second World War wiped it out but prompted the creation of most of our current supranational institutions. COVID-19 is not only the living proof of the dangers of isolationism, but it also represents a clear opportunity for the next leap forward. In fact, nation states have proven over time their lack of willingness to accept guidance and directions on how to tackle crises, while being ready to take credit for supranational bodies’ successes and to point fingers at them when anything goes wrong. But this cannot continue any longer. While heads of states continue to look inwards and disregard the real tragedies that the world is facing, as well as common opportunities that may arise, citizens need to act. Unfortunately, we do not have a vote in the election of the UN Secretary-General, and have little sway through traditional democratic tools on geopolitical trends.
We have one power: to unite people across borders and do the job our governments are not capable of doing, pushing for global collaboration and actions. The only way to tackle the most significant threats of our time is through the creation of a global movement of people standing as one to fight for our future. |
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