In times of acute crisis such as the present one, it gives some solace to re-read the seminal book by the veteran British diplomat Robert Cooper The Breaking of Nations: “When you have a problem you cannot solve, enlarge the context.” Time and again in the past, Europe succeeded in reverting inward-looking navel-gazing and impasses by bringing in new resources and new thinking from the outside. As this initial brutal phase of the COVID-19 pandemics continues, Europe may find much-needed purpose and unity in walking the pre-crisis walk and look beyond its Southern borders, towards Africa.
As nations worldwide mobilise and direct their resources to fight COVID-19 within their own jurisdictions, Africa inevitably will take a low priority; but once testing is scaled up, infection rates are expected to surge and deaths may increase commensurately. For Europe to enlarge the context, it is essential that it keeps in clear sight Africa’s needs and the dire consequences of inaction.
De-globalization
In these long, uncertain days since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the tables have turned on the European mindset and institutions. Europe spent a decade debating how centrists could handle the populist rage against immigration and globalization. COVID-19 sorted this dilemma out in a matter of days. For the first time since World War 2, closing borders and erecting barriers is not a choice. In a domino-effect of unilateral national decisions, country after country followed its neighbour in declaring lockdowns, curfews, closing borders and banning travels. Anyone proposing something different – read: herd immunity – is singled out as unconscionable or mad. In so doing, the pandemic has turned its head on the key European intuition that security and stability could be best attained by means of exchanges and integration. For now, at least, survival equals total lockdown and closure, end of story.
