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Is the global coronavirus crisis a symptom of a deeper crisis in our economic system? This is one of the questions that the French historian Jérôme Baschet, a professor at the Autonomous University of Chiapas, Mexico, tries to answer in this edition of Escala in Paris.
Contrary to those who defend “Collapsology”, the imminent collapse of the world, the total collapse of a planet in terminal phase, the historian maintains that we are facing a structural crisis of capitalism in a world where the balance is very fragile and that in any moment the situation can swing to either side. This is the case of the coronavirus crisis, which for more than a year has kept the planet in constant emergency.
“The idea is that in a situation of apparent equilibrium, things can swing to one side or the other, and that from this situation there can be brutal turns in a certain direction and what I want to highlight is the unstable character in the world in which we live, everything that seems stable, is unpredictable, “explains Baschet, for whom the Covid-19 crisis is an example of” those brutal twists with realities that no one expected and that projected us into a hitherto unknown reality “.
Baschet maintains in his book ‘Basculements: Mondes émergents, possibles désirables’, which translates into Spanish as “Vaivenes: Worlds emerging, possible desirable”, that the pandemic is part of a larger phenomenon with a recent multiplication of zoonoses (pathogens that are transmitted from animal to man) and blames intensive livestock farming or monoculture for these emerging viruses despite the fact that the bat is a wild animal.
“These new zoonoses have multiplied tremendously since the 1980s and even more at the beginning of the 21st century and the causes must be sought in the destruction of the forest in which wild animals live and with deforestation, bats move to where humans live. Another factor is the mega farms of chickens and pigs that are very dangerous infection nests “, warns the professor.
Is progress that bad?
Never before has life expectancy been as high as it is today, it has doubled since the 19th century; And yet the idea has spread that we are worse than ever with a planet that is depleting, unbridled climate change, a saturation of cities, diseases such as hypertension, diabetes or obesity.
Is progress that bad? “It is not a question of denying the important advances in medicine that have allowed us to live longer, it is obvious, but at the same time, the capitalist economic system is the most pathogenic, the one that has generated the most diseases. Air pollution causes hundreds of thousands of dead, pesticides that cause cancer or industrial food that causes overweight, “says Baschet.
The outlook is bleak and is already wreaking havoc on many people, especially young people, protagonists of the global demonstrations against the climate on Fridays. Are we not sacrificing an entire generation with this catastrophic discourse, instead of also emphasizing the positives of progress? For the historian, this would be like “closing our eyes so as not to worry, but that is not the question, the point is that this is a reality and if we do not act, there will be more pandemics.”
In ‘Basculements’, one of the possible scenarios is that of entering a post-capitalist era, since the health crisis has put many of its principles on the ropes. But is that possibility real or is it just a desirable world?
“The era of pandemics that we have entered, it is likely that the coronavirus will not be the last, they will generate increasingly strong crises and opens the possibility of a transition towards a green capitalism,” says the author.
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source https://pledgetimes.com/stopover-in-paris-the-era-of-pandemics-could-favor-a-transition-to-green-capitalism/
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