Three Political Regimes, Three Responses to the COVID-19 Crisis
Jean De Munck, Lee Gilette · Bristol University Press eBooks · 2022
How are we to manage the pandemic? What will happen in its wake? Some believe the COVID-19 crisis will lead spontaneously to a virtuous awareness of the dead ends of anarchic globalization. They dream of an end to the crisis which will also be, in one fell swoop, the end of deregulated capitalism. Such optimism is dubious. No end to capitalism is on the horizon. Meanwhile, and unfortunately, authoritarian and populist political tendencies are immune to COVID-19. There is no single automatic, rational political outcome inherent to this crisis. Democracies will be severely tested, not only by the health crisis but also by the economic crisis to come. When it comes to crises, Europe has ample experience. After 1945, Europe responded with a model of practical synergy between the state and capitalism. The welfare state’s architecture, boldly rebuilt, can inspire a unique response to the current crisis. The economist Eloi Laurent is right when he says, ‘The most useful lesson of the beginning of this crisis is also the most universal: the welfare state is the strategic institution for the 21st century’. But two dominant models challenge the welfare state today: the authoritarian state capitalist model and the right-wing populist model. They shape the policies responding to the COVID-19 crisis.