No time to die: Coronavirus and other 21st century challenges

World affairs are in the iron grip of simultaneous crises, which will shape the destinies of several states in the decades ahead. Let’s start with coronavirus.

Awareness of coronavirus was picking up steam when I was in the Kurdistan Region last month, but seemed remote at first. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) was soon working hard to limit the spread of the virus – given Kurdistan’s proximity to Iran, a major incubator of the epidemic.

The consequences are already severe for an oil-producing country because demand for oil, particularly from China as the workhouse of the world, has slipped and hobbled oil prices. 

The downturn in China is reflected in cinema takings on Chinese New Year in January when $4 million worth of tickets were bought compared to $1.7 billion last year. Across the world, mass gatherings are being cancelled or postponed, including the new James Bond film, No Time To Die.  

One British MP told the House of Commons the constant crisscrossing of 650 MPs to and from parliament could make them a vector of the virus. There is wariness in public spaces.

Another victim of the culture of caution is the postponement of an All-party Parliamentary Group (APPG) delegation visit to Kurdistan this month. We planned to go just after Newroz but cannot know if public life will be up and running by then or if it is wise to travel anywhere.

Governments will be judged by how they react to the crisis. The British government, which rehearsed the scenario last year, seems to be on top of the crisis with clear public messaging on personal hygiene and experts sharing information in real time. 

The Chinese Communist Party’s initial prevarication may have been overtaken by its ability to close down megacities and restrict movement, which seems to have stemmed the tide there.  

The Islamic regime in Iran could face rebellion from below if it is proved that delays in tackling the infection were motivated by a desire to increase the turnout in the recent elections where a low poll of 20 percent underlined the leadership’s weakness. US President Donald Trump’s garbled approach may also haunt him as the election approaches there.

The latest thinking is that 80 percent of the population could succumb, but mostly with relatively trivial symptoms, although many will have to quarantine themselves for two weeks. The worst case scenario is that one percent could die, although some experts think it may be higher. Whether the global death rate will top the 200,000 to 600,000 deaths from ordinary flu remains to be seen.

It’s easy to see the current period as prelapsarian – the time before the fall. The Times columnist Danny Finkelstein says coronavirus is a 9/11 moment for politics that could change everything.

He outlines tensions between nativism and international co-operation: shutting the door on spreaders and becoming self-sufficient in food and medicines versus countervailing pressures for international powers and institutions and much bigger aid programmes to improve public health in developing countries and boost the World Health Organisation. 

I’d add that forced trials of remote working – telecommuting – and technology to avoid international travel may become more common if they work well. State action to save otherwise viable businesses and help the low paid and the 15 percent of the UK workforce which is self-employed, both with less ability to ride out the storm at home, may prompt a rethink of the role of government in the economy. And there is already a debate about deglobalisation that questions complex global supply chains as the model for many economies. 

Financial Times writer Henry Mance says: “Coronavirus – by disrupting our lives and causing painful tragedy – may introduce a new acceptance of unpredictability into our thinking.” If we are on the cusp of a major pandemic, then we are also on the verge of rethinking what we have long taken for granted as the crisis becomes an opportunity for different intellectual groups to dust off their pet projects and claim that they have causes whose time has come. 

But coronavirus is not the worst of the world’s challenges. There’s “Westlessness,” which the recent Munich Security Conference defined as a divided and in some parts increasingly illiberal West that seems to be retreating from the global stage. French President Emmanuel Macron talked about a growing inability of the West to shape the international order in line with its values.

One obvious problem is President Trump’s stated desire to quit the Middle East, which caused chaos when American troops suddenly withdrew in northern Syria. In Erbil, I kept a watching eye on attempts to form a new Iraqi government and talk about forcing the American troops to leave. This would make it impossible for UK and other troops to stay in Iraq or Kurdistan, despite the re-emergence of the Islamic State group (ISIS). Like many, I dread an early morning Trump tweet about withdrawing American troops from Iraq. 

Westlessness means that smaller countries can no longer rely on American diplomacy and power. That may engender political self-sufficiency or mean exposure to the predations of bigger powers. American insularity may encourage the remaining engaged great powers, the UK, Germany, and France, to jointly recalibrate their external policies. The perils of a pandemic may even put Brexit into perspective and more easily prod a deal on the new trading and other relationships between the UK and the EU by the end of the year. 

Coronavirus could change everything and so could the US general election in November. A relatively minor shift of voters in fly-over states such as Wisconsin from Trump to whoever is the Democratic Party candidate could make a massive long-term difference as the world recovers from coronavirus and adjusts to its lessons. And there’s the small issue of the continuing climate emergency too. 2020 looks set to be a pivotal year of the early 21st century.

Gary Kent is the Secretary of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) and a Fellow of Soran University. He writes this column for Rudaw in a personal capacity. The address for the all-party group is appgkurdistan@gmail.com. 

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rudaw.