This has increased the divide between the “haves” and the “have nots” to a point that can no longer be ignored. Third, on top of the inequalities I just described, the COVID-19 virus has also hit some countries and ethnic groups harder than others.
But so far, rich countries have benefited disproportionately. Similarly, they’ve supported the swift development of effective vaccines and treatments, which have the power to help all countries recover. They’ve allowed some groups to carry on working or studying, for example, while others have lost their jobs or fallen even further behind. So, data and technology have taken on extraordinary power. Second, this is the first big crisis of the hyperconnected world ( another of my favorite topics). Governments now have a moral imperative to help those that have borne the brunt of the virus and its effects. The money’s still coming, with the US government working to implement further packages focusing on social spending and infrastructure. Let’s look at these differences in more detail.įirst, according to the International Monetary Fund, in 2020, global governments took US$12t in fiscal action, and central banks took about US$7.5t in monetary action, to save lives and prop up the world economy. The now-existential threat of climate change.The moral obligation on the “haves” to help the “have nots” that have borne the brunt of the crisis.So, what really is different this time? In my view, it’s: Allocating a set amount of multilateral stimulus spending to “green” measures: the 2007–08 global financial crisis.Collecting, sharing and analyzing data and granting loans to businesses: the European Coal and Steel Community, established in the 1951 Treaty of Paris.Using deficit spending to fund rescue packages, while mobilizing the private sector to create jobs and stimulate growth: the 1933 New Deal and the 1948 Marshall Plan.Many have been tried and tested before, either in response to past crises or at other pivotal moments in political history. My point is that the impacts of the COVID-19 crisis aren’t necessarily new in fact, neither are the solutions. The COVID-19 crisis differs from its predecessors in four key ways Demand for many goods is also outstripping supply, causing the rate of inflation to rise and asset bubbles to grow. In 2020, the average global debt stood at 97% of GDP, and an estimated 95m more people fell into extreme poverty than had been predicted before the pandemic. That’s not to downplay the challenges governments face today. And the US economy shrank by a third between 1929 (the Wall Street Crash) and 1933, compared with an estimated 3.5% in 2020. But generally, commentators have used it about the scale of the pandemic response, not the pandemic itself.Īfter all, the Spanish flu pandemic infected 500m and killed 20m–50m worldwide, compared with almost 250m infections and 5m deaths so far for COVID-19. Like me, you probably couldn’t count the number of times you’ve read or heard the word “unprecedented” in relation to the COVID-19 crisis. I’ll then ask: how can governments use the lessons of the past, and the progress they’ve made during the COVID-19 pandemic, to solve the challenges of today and tomorrow?
For each blog, I’ll look at what happened, how governments responded and whether their policies worked.
Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it series#
That’s why I’ve decided to focus my next blog series on what governments can learn from past crises and pivotal moments in recent history.
But as Churchill had recently led Britain through a huge crisis, his words are highly relevant for governments today. In my view, the answer lies in a 1948 quote by the British statesman Winston Churchill: “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” how can governments use the lessons of the past.to solve the challenges of today and tomorrow?Īdmittedly, he was paraphrasing something by the writer and philosopher George Santayana. If we don’t learn from history, we’re doomed to repeat it Nearly two years on, as governments begin taking a tentative look beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, the question is: what’s next? by taking the pace of digital transformation up a gear, the pandemic was turning the government of the future into the government of today My thesis was that by taking the pace of digital transformation up a gear, the pandemic was turning the government of the future into the government of today. Last year, while the COVID-19 pandemic was at its height, I blogged about the broader impacts it may have on key areas of government, and how they could respond. How can governments use the lessons of the past to reframe the future?
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