« In the space of a few months of the COVID pandemic, decades of development have been knocked off course »(UNOCHA, 2021, p6). It has proven the world makeup to be fragile and shed light on the true power dynamics of its architecture. For the first time in recent generations, the global population has been universally affected by one shared risk: COVID 19, yet the response has demonstrated wide gaps in universal thinking, with inequalities rising on all angles, adding to an already complex situation. Extreme poverty has increased for the first time since 1998 with estimates of up to 150 million new people falling into extreme poverty in the course of only 2 years (ibid., p20). Between 2010 and 2019, the number of internally displaced people due to conflict has risen to an astronomical 79 million, in addition to the number of refugees doubling from 10 million to 20.4 million (ibid., p28). In 2019 climate and weather events were key drivers for hunger and food insecurity, with 34 million people suffering from weather-driven acute food security, an increase of 17% to the previous year. Furthermore, by the end of 2020 the number of acutely food insecure people is believed to have increased to 270 million, representing a rise of 82% since pre-pandemic times (ibid., p32). Looking to 2021, the amount of people requiring humanitarian assistance and protection will have doubled compared to 5 years ago (p46), meaning 1 in 33 people worldwide need help (compared to 1 in 45 in 2020) (p66).
To a certain extent, COVID-19 has united the world. The weight of the COVID-19 risk outweighed risks to authorities, regulators, and investors, pushing them to “break molds”, accept levels of investment risk, with record levels of public funding made very quickly available (Agrawal et al., 2021). An “unprecedented level of collaboration among global pharmaceutical companies, biotech companies, health authorities and regulatory agencies, and a range of public and private institutions that committed funding research and other resources” has led the development and deployment of a vaccine described as “a scientific, industrial, regulatory and logistical achievement that will make history” (ibid.). In addition, the pandemic has led to a confluence of public-private health diplomacy and displays of soft power: “non-state actors such as nongovernmental organizations, philanthropists and private companies have emerged to fill gaps where federal or national governments have failed to provide for their own citizens” (Cole & Dodds, 2021). Civil society too has stepped up to meet the needs of populations, with, for example, scouts across the world contributing 500 million hours of service to support community initiatives during the pandemic .
The geopolitical framework of the COVID response, however, is paradoxical. “COVID-19 is a multi-centred pandemic: an outbreak of countless local epidemics, each one slightly different and requiring great focus on locally driven and multi-sectoral strategies” (UNOCHA, p216). The infectious transnational disease can only be overcome if it is addressed globally and, in every country. However, competition between geopolitical power blocks accelerated concerns about production chain dependencies, pressured governments to protect their national economies and supply chains, as well nationalist governments protecting their vaccine supply for their own citizens (Cole & Dodds, 2021). Despite committing to the COVAX initiative, many countries concluded pre-purchase agreements with manufacturers, stockpiling doses and placing export restrictions on vaccines, raw ingredients and medical supplies effectively undermining the equity and partnerships they pledged to (Lombé & Nkengasong. 2021, p1354). On the other hand, power imbalances encouraged health diplomacy between countries in the form of medical and humanitarian assistance (such as Russia providing supplies to Serbia, or China to Italy) (Cole & Dodds, 2021). Comparisons too have been made on leadership surrounding the crisis, with on the one hand “solid leadership based on clear communication, empathy and alignment with science and politics” as seen with New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern or German Chancellor Angela Merkel, versus the “shambolic, self-serving and sometimes deliberately misleading reactions” from US President Donald Trump or Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro (The Lancet, 2020).
When looking to Africa– with a population of 1.2 billion people (UN News, 2021)- it is clear the world has failed to ensure equitable access to health (Loembé & Nkengasong, 2021, p1353). Despite global leaders and health experts urging for fair and equitable availability of COVID-19 vaccines, and that “no one is secure until everyone is secure”, only 2% (UN, 2021) of the “global common good” has been administered in Africa (Lombé & Nkengasong. 2021). The head of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has described how the longer vaccine inequity persists, the more the virus will circulate and change, increasing the risk of more variants emerging that will render vaccines less effective, and crucially pointing out: it is not a question of capacity or experience in rolling out the vaccine, but rather, that African countries “have been left behind by the rest of the world” (UN News, 2021). Despite pledges of “leave no one behind” through initiatives such as COVAX or “vaccine diplomacy” affaires, 3 out of 4 of the 1 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses had been given in only 10 countries by April 2021 (Kreier as cited by Lombé & Nkengasong. 2021, p1353). One of the reasons Africa is lagging is the lack of national investment in research and development (R&D) programs and industry and an over-reliance on external financial influx (ibid., p1358). Africa only produces 1 % of all its vaccines (excluding the COVID vaccine) and only 10 local companies are operating some form of vaccine production, despite the very high prevalence of infectious diseases (ibid., p.1355). The region has responded strongly in coordinated efforts. African Union member states have rallied for an “All African approach” and endorsed a “COVID-19 Vaccine Development and Access Strategy” in collaboration with the African Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to complement COVAX efforts, directing a number of initiatives aimed at strengthening capacity, provide regional stewardship and coordination, aiming to “achieve substantive impact through high level political engagement”, as well as promoting investments in local innovations (ibid., p1358).
The current pandemic has shown once more the importance of equity in public health (Binns & Low, 2021, p185) and society more generally. It is not guided by the wealth or health expenditure of a country, but rather within population groups: the virus is more likely to severely affect those who are socially disadvantaged (ibid.) and be conditioned by social determinants of health. Take the US for example, it stands as the country with the most COVID cases (2 million) and most deaths (0.5 million) globally, though being the country with the highest spending per capita on health, it also has distinct inequity in wealth and access to health services (ibid.). The variations in incidents and mortality are particularly notable between the upper and lowest socioeconomic groups, with ethnic minorities disproportionately affected, elderly, gender etc. . Furthermore, the long-term economic effects of the pandemic too are disprotionately distributed within the population: US billionaires are estimated to have had a wealth increase of nearly 40% in contrast to 100 000 businesses shut, 73 million lost jobs and 29 million households not having sufficient food (Collins, 2021). On a global scale, the top 1000 billionaire’s fortunes are thriving having returned to their pre-pandemic highs in just 9 months, compared to the world’s poor’s recovery expected to take 14 times that: over a decade (Bekhout et al., 2021). Oxfam released a report in January 2021 entitled “The inequality virus” pointing out that for the first time in history, inequality has risen in virtually every country, noting that the World Bank, IMF and OEDC have all expressed deep concern of the harmful effects this entails (p.9). It is also noted that the World Banks calculated that if countries act now to address this, the recovery could take closer to 3 years. Indeed, the World Bank calls for strong interventions to avoid the pandemic crisis triggering cycles of higher income inequality, lower social mobility, and lower resilience for future shocks (The World Bank, 2021).
Global fragility is strongly linked to converging forces of COVID-19, armed conflict and climate change with effects likely to intensify far into the future (World Bank, 2021, p11). In the face of these multiple shocks, the World Bank calls for nations to work on many fronts to save lives and livelihoods and provide for the most vulnerable particularly through inclusivity (ibid., p1).
“No country acting alone can adequately control, much less prevent, the type of emergencies the world is now facing. Future preparedness, prevention, and crisis response must be global and collaborative.” (ibid, p18).
Cooperation and coordination are vital for improving pragmatic foundations of policy making and very importantly, to nurture social solidarity on country and community levels, and ensure governments’ are both trusted and trustworthy (ibid.). Research has proven that “policies are crucial but not sufficient”, with implementations often ineffective in most low-income economies, proving a need for building capabilities on all levels including administrative systems (ibid.,p17). Unprecedented uncertainty provoked by COVID-19 necessitated enhanced learning and improving data. Response and recovery strategies may go hand-in-hand with development understanding and approaches, and knowledge outcomes including data from the crisis response may “inform future action on core development problems” .
One of the most important factors put forward in preventing the spread of COVID-19 “is to empower people with the right information” (Reddy & Gupta, 2020). Consequences of pandemic influenzas on vulnerable populations depends on the effectiveness of health risk communication, with strategic planning requiring consideration of “life circumstances, cultural values and perspectives on risk” linked to sociocultural, economic, psychological and health factors that influence behaviour during a pandemic and, in effect, may either jeopardise or facilitate public health intervention (Vaughan & Tinker, 2009). Divergent communications from global leaders, incoherence, reversals in messaging and governments seeking to provide false reassurances has resulted in an erosion of public trust (The Lancet, 2020). Miscommunications, and mass media sensationalist reporting has fed a spread of harmful misinformation (ibid.). Advances in communication technologies have amplified the sharing of information, though studies have revealed that people are more likely to share falsehoods than evidence-based information (Mheidly & Fares, 2020, p411). Governments have been faced with thwarted public opinion on all levels associated to the Covid infodemic.
There has been a significant global response to the Infodemic particularly by international organisations, major science bodies, social-media and technology-corporations (ibid., p413). Multilateral organisations such as the UN developed mechanisms to provide reliable and up to date information in the form of cybersecurity support, online webinars, the WHO’s “myth busters” portal, as well as its risk communication team setting up the Information Network for Epidemics aimed at sharing information with specific target groups. Furthermore, governments across the globe responded: the IMF reported 193 countries took economic measures and adopted policy changes in response to the pandemic, as well as public health strategies, engaging the public through social media, news reports and other (ibid.). On the corporate side, social media executives established campaigns to restrict false information and support the WHO to be the first source of information visible to the public such as Google’s “SOS Alert” initiative (ibid., p414). This was complemented with scientific and medical bodies taking actions to promote science-based knowledge, to prompt public health policy making, and assist health workers and the public with research results. Many medical and scientific journals ensured timely dissemination of scientific data, with journals and publishing companies creating resource centers on their websites and adopting open access publications for materials to support access to science-based evidence (ibid.).
The global response to COVID 19 has transformed processes. It prompted unprecedented government action around the world (Hale et al., 2020), and generated renewed interest in coordinating global responses particularly through medical and social research, technology innovation and optimising the complex dynamics of actors and systems during the outbreak (Margherita et al., 2021, p1). While the pandemic holds most characteristics typical of emergencies, the epidemic management scenario can shed light onto the intersection of technology, innovation management and societal challenges, while also driving the need to “coordinate multilateral decisions and actions into synergestic and systemic efforts” (ibid., 1-2). The pandemic has required identification of optimal decisions and actions, with national and local governments facing the large challenge of coordinating actors (multistakeholder and multidisciplinary) as well as resources and activities in flexible ways to design and adopt effective responses (ibid.). Coordination science that has ensued may contribute to enhance decision making and emergency management, address heterogeneity of actors and stakeholders, multidimension effects, diverse activities for resilience and the crucial aspect of knowledge sharing mechanisms (ibid., p8).
In the face of the rampant rise in inequalities and the converging forces of COVID and climate change, it is clear the baseline causes for the world’s fragility need to be addressed. The complexity and chaos of contemporary global societies make it difficult to produce neat and comprehensive accounts (Tufte, 2017, vii), and so, taking a multidisciplinary and multistakeholder approach to addressing global needs is necessary. As seen in the case of the inefficient international intervention in Haiti due to lack of true engagement and adapted programming for the local communities to address root causes that weaken the countries capacity, and in contrast, the success of interventions when considering local populations as partners and leaders of their own development, local capacity is at the core of strengthening resilience, and ability to overcome societal and crisis challenges. The Capabilities approach presented by Amarthya Sen push for development as “a process of expanding the real freedoms that people enjoy” (1999, Sen, as cited by Tufte, p27), whereby “development should enlarge people’s choices (Peet, 1999), nurture a culture of tolerance and peace (Albright, 2005), and expose social and political contradictions, thereby removing the power of oppressors (Freire, 1970)” (Sein et al., 2019). A leading concept in contemporary development is Touraine’s call for new social thought that places ordinary people at the center of contemporary visions and practices of development (Tufte, 2017, p11), and the capacity and aspirations of the individual at the center of development (ibid, p.28). In essence, the reasoning surrounding these approaches is that through enhancing the capacity of local communities to organize themselves, communicate and advocate on core issue relevant to stakeholders will achieve improved services and effectively improve livelihoods (ibid., p6). Considering COVID as one tangible risk that has resulted in historical global coordination efforts may provide insight into how we deal with other global risks such as Climate Change. The global makeup of the world is characterised by acceleration of speeds and interconnectedness, new opportunities and constraints, as well as possibilities and vulnerabilities (Hylland Eriksen 2014, p.1). Perhaps the new global collaboration of financial firms -committed to align businesses, lending and investing, and science-based transition plans- committing 130 trillion dollars to blunt the impacts of Climate Change (Baker, 2021) may be a demonstration of a renewed global push toward global equity and transforming climate crisis management, however this remains to be seen. Response to global crisis « need to reflect past experience and lessons from complex development intervention » (UNOCHA, 2021). Harnessing the lessons learned during this pandemic, particularly intersection of learnings from gaps in policy and aspiration, enhanced knowledge and improvements to data, while investing in preparedness and prevention and most importantly, expanding cooperation and coordination provide a way forward in building the architectural strength of the world, where long term solutions that are sustainable and suited to all communities may prevail.
References:
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Baker, J. 2021. Mark Carney’s Ambitious $130 Trillion Glasgow Financial Alliance For Net-Zero. Forbes. 8 November 2021.https://www.forbes.com/sites/jillbaker/2021/11/08/mark-carneys-ambitious-130-trillion-glasgow-financial-alliance-for-net-zero/
Bekhout, E. Galasso, N., Lawsom, M., Morales, P. A. R., Taneja, A., Pimentel, D. A. V., (2021). The Inequality Virus : Bringing together a world torn apart by coronavirus through a fair, just and sustainable economy. Oxfam. 25 January 2021. Online. https://www.oxfam.org/en/research/inequality-virus
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Note from the author:
Firstly, thank you for taking the time to explore our blog. As you may have seen, this project has allowed us freedom to present topics that to us, are relevant and important when questioning the theme of ICT4D, Aid Work & Communicating Development. Through blog form- a very different medium than we have been used to within our academic studies – has allowed us to reflect on new aspects such as readability, accessibility, attractivity and how we communicate our topics with people outside of our academic circle.
Our texts are critical but grounded in the reasoning that despite clear systemic and structural issues there is opportunity for improvement, particularly by applying better approaches to development- with better development thinking, or developmentality.
One of the risks when studying the world, and the global makeup, is to be disheartened: with complex crisis, drawn out conflicts, current global pandemic, and inability to address overarching issues such as the ongoing and very much impending doom of climate change and associated impacts. However, there is also strength and optimism when considering humans as resilient, capable and strong. There is greater acknowledgement of what true communication is, and push for participation and engagement from all stakeholders on all activities, and bottom up approach that feeds locally adapted and locally led change.
I’m excited to be studying this course, learning about the transition toward improved communication for development approaches, that can be applied in all domains. Looking at the topics presented in our blog and those of our fellow classmates proves there is deep reflection within the academic and professional field, questioning the status quo and providing suggestion and solutions for long term solutions. Our class is indeed but a micro part of a wider global reflection on how we do things. Academia, reflection, innovations and communities will pave the way forward. The world is going through profound changes, and it is time to break molds, consider lessons learned, as well as improve our activities in a collaborative and constructive way.
