This headline quote from Winston Churchill says all about the
current global pandemonium in leadership crisis. We are staring at a black hole
that by its indecisiveness could harm more, worse still when they shift goals
every day. We have our favourites in most countries where mediocrity competes
to decide the best path. What results do we expect from most?
In the din of the constant up-and-down of corona-virus news,
both from scientific world and the financial centres of the world, it’s easy to
lose sight of the scariest scenario that is staring at our face, we are getting
blind sighted by the enormity of the problems that is bigger than anything that
we have seen in our lifetime.
There’s no magic bullet fired by a Knight in shining armour
that will wean away our predicament and dispel the clouds of concerns with a
ray of hope. We have to look at the despair with a glint of hope that is the
only way to moderate expectations. But notwithstanding the gloom around virus,
we mustn’t give up looking for hope. Human civilisation has evolved around that
just one word- Hope.
What happens then, when efforts of thousands of Scientists,
Epidemiologist and Medical Professionals fail in a few initial attempts? Will they
get busy reinventing the vaccine again? Yes, they will, enterprise is part of
human DNA- etched eternally. Realism demands every confluence of event that
could occur with reasonable probability has a tinge of Hope. No virus has ever
been able to kill it -in the past, now and also in future as well.
To me, it is a anecdotal reality that there could be no
effective Covid-19 transformative therapy that could pass human trials with
risk-rewards in favour in next twelve months.
Most Governments have planned for the worst-case scenario,
some with deeper studies and some just follow without delving in details of the
fallout during those apocalyptic hours- as that possibility could never be ruled
out. The Governments those are ill prepared with a plan for COVID-19 would face
a major governance failure and erosion of faith in them world over. The world is facing its worst
socioeconomic downturn in last hundred years. Closed factories, quarantines and
global lockdowns have caused economic activities & livelihood to collapse.
The
grim reality, underscores the magnitude of the shock, which the pandemic has
inflicted on both advanced and developing economies and the daunting task that
policymakers face in containing its fallout. It is an arduous journey ahead for
all. The world still looks like a killing field where a funeral has also been a
luxury for the victims of Covid-19. Most of us cannot recall anything like this
in our lifetime.
Incentives
to industries and people can work only to a point – but this life threatening
fear of infections inhibits people to come out of a mindset that is overwhelmed
with memories & news of acute traumas. The human mind is psychologically affected
that would need to be de-scarred in millions by counselling and instilling
confidence to get back their lives. We hardy consider psychosomatic afflictions
as an illness needing similar consideration as any other illness that humans
grapple with. Insensitiveness to others plight is also a serious malaise that
our societies now need to get aware of and act on it with compassion. For
healing societies & nations, we would now need millions of volunteers to
console and handhold the world, country by country, that has lost hundreds and
thousands of lives of near and dear ones across all continents. This trauma
still continues unabated.
Country
after country that are considered as citadel of solidity and invincibility currently
are showing cracks in their walls and resorting to panic button by hoarding
medicinal supplies, basic essentials, controlling food supplies and insulating people
from global travels, the crisis seriously has impeded growth and would reverse
decades of gains that accrued from globalization. Ring fencing, a country &
states within, would be more harmful than a measured unwinding of the economy
& society. In coming days, global leaders would be compelled to take this
choice, as economic imperatives would leave no choice but to let go such
controls. Several European countries are now resorting to it already, including
some of the worst distressed ones; we would know the depth of the rut from the
path taken by them. We have little choices as of now. Options are limited and
risk-rewards are equally loaded with potency to swing both ways.
Our
best hope to kick-start the economy lies in the hope of believing in herd
immunity and as it happens, which it should, more and more people would get
immune to COVID-19 and fewer fatalities would happen. This is a hope and
assumes better case circumstances based on past episodes of pandemic.
Eventually, lockdown cannot be perennial and sensing this, many global leaders
would now start to advocate this postulate of herd immunity & for that we
have no empirical and anecdotal evidences from current crisis, but history
supports such plausibility during pandemics, depending on the acuteness of it,
time span may vary. The time for soft selling the idea of herd immunity is
ripe.
The
magnitude and speed of collapse in activity that has followed the pandemic is
unlike anything experienced in our lifetime. No country & its leader can
sit tight on it. Proactive steps would also decide the emerging leadership that
is under the lenses globally. Considerable uncertainty remains as the health of
the economy will be dictated by a single vector- the trajectory of the virus. The
undercurrent would be still palpable & nervous globally. If the pandemic
persists into the second half of the year, which it likely should, despite
Governments are avoiding admitting it, the global economy contraction could be
several times more damaging and the anticipated rebound in 2021, as wider
consensus, could fail to materialize if additional waves of the virus spread
later in the year.
Just
take top three economies of USA, China and Japan going into a negative growth
rate by just 2% on an average, which is most certain, then GDP of those
countries would shrink by at least 8 trillion Dollars in negative from a
projected positive growth of 12 trillion Dollars in similar timeframe. This
excludes likely negative contribution by Germany, India, South Korea and rest
of 20 countries that also have nearly 40% contributions to the global GDP. The other
173 countries, outside the top 20, make up less than 22% of total global
economy. It means that we not only are going to give away the gains that we
should have normally done, but would also lose about twelve trillion Dollars as
an overall GDP shrinkage globally. This would make the world go in a tailspin
and trigger many social chaoses worldwide.
The
impact of economic collapse, which is visible to me and should be to most of us
at this point of time, would be unlike anything we have ever seen in history.
All of this just because of an invisible enemy that world has not been able to
overcome as yet.
The
minimisation of the pandemic impact would need a calibrated response from
global leaders. This could mean relook at global governance issue and
protection of national industries & businesses that despite incentive would
find it hard to avert bankruptcy & collapse. It would naturally mean loss
of livelihood for millions across the globe. None can remain insulated from it-
some less, some more.
It
would also raise conflict and parallel realities that have portrayed different
manifestations from different perspectives. The necessity of fostering
international cooperation would be an imperative that would be a compelling
need to stave off a common enemy. It also means that presently there is no common
mechanism in the global arena for a growth consensus as I do expect
undercurrent of hatred and backlash to decouple national economy from a global
supply chain. It is very likely that the new economic order emerging would be
country specific and individual countries in the west would significantly
invest in capacity buildings.
The
inability of global bodies, like UNO & its arms, WHO, World Bank, WTO and
other bodies out of multilateralism cooperation have failed the world and are
losing their grip for consolidation in a post Corona world where global funding
to them is bound to shrink. If it does, then the structures & modalities would
be very different and would emerge finely tooth-combed from the domination of a
few countries at such global bodies. So would be challenged the veto mechanism
of the UN Security Council. Today it has only stifled world progress and
emerging leadership’s stakes for a wider participation by the rogue nations that
have been sanctioned veto powers decades ago.
Today
the world is sitting on a ticking time bomb, for that the plug is not yet
pulled, but an economic pandemic never seen in the history is not remedied,
then the force of implosion would fragment and lacerate the world with noncooperation
from economic activities, that would see massive unemployment, massive business
failures in MSME & MSE and significant contractions of large businesses
that would put many in the poverty abyss in developed countries as well.
World
& countries have hardly any option to chose, but to allow opening of the
economies, despite the risk of lives & to pin its hope on herd immunity to
move the wheels to restore normalcy over a period of time. Otherwise, the
genesis of economic apocalypse written in history would not have a Noah’s Ark
to salvage the world and its population.
Today
economic acceleration is the pivot that decides wellness than any other vector
that measures a prosperous society and a country. Any slippages of that is a
social moribund that pushes the other social markers worse much rapidly. This
time this pandemic and its economic force would not spare anyone and any
nation. People would have more expectations from their governments and failure
to deliver would see a political upheaval globally that helps emerge a new
leadership with new hope and fresh horizons.
Failure
to do so would also shift topic of discussion as poverty in poor and emerging
economies would no more be discussed, but it would be talking point in
developed nations as well.
World
orders are getting redefined and in coming months & years & would also
set a new leadership matrix, where weaker nations would be more vociferous and
demanding than to be sold to the lollipops.
The
hegemony of dominance would witness a war of attrition and one of defiance that
can be only be bridged by trust that world would find it hard to find in
current world order. Therefore, we are staring at a cautious world where
countries would not be defined by groups & zonal sectors, but the
forthrightness to restore global confidence. We would witness titans falling by
the waysides and hope would be the driver that leaders must espouse and
demonstrate by assertive actions. Talking parrots of the world, my country also
leads in this, would not be given any further option to lead the world and
nations, nor any trust be reposed in rogue nations & its leaders. They have
done more than enough damage already to the world.
Indeed
we are transcending through an epoch time that is bound to rewrite world
history where we have defined a villain but have not yet found a hero.
The
search is on.
12
May 2020
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