Call for Essays on the Post-COVID-19 World

by Véronique Zanetti (ZiF Bielefeld, Germany), G. Ary Plons ki (UBIAS, IEA São Paulo, Brazil) and Britta Padberg (ZiF Bielefeld, Germany) | Originally posted on the blog Interdisciplinarity

Heavily shaken by the corona pandemics many of us are currently thinking about how we could contribute to overcome this unprecedented situation. The COVID-19 crisis not only challenges disease control and crisis management, but may also have long-term and far-reaching impacts on states, societies and international cooperation. There are increasing indications that the world will look different after the crisis and that globalization will be questioned in many areas. According to these observations, the COVID-19 crisis would mark a turning point. In times of deep uncertainty, science is asked to look to the future and to flank a rational discourse about how to react to the current global crisis, and therefore now better cope with other tantamount global challenges such as the climate change.

Since this challenge is genuinely interdisciplinary, Institutes for Advanced Studies are rich pools to fish for visionary ideas and scientific observations. We are very happy that a number of distinguished and young scholars from different fields and countries agreed to write short essays on how the world will change and how it should change. The pieces will be posted bit by bit, two texts per week. Since science and art make a good couple in developing a good sensorium for tectonic shifts we also asked the comic artist Oliver Grajewski to complement and contrast the academic way of thinking. He will deliver one short comic series each week.

We hope that the blog will contribute to sketching out ideas of a world that is more sustainable, fairer and fit for the future and are very much looking forward to lively discussions.

Selected contributions

	Science and its public after the pandemic by Lorraine Daston, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, Germany
	Nationalism and transnationalism in times of the coronavirus pandemic by Christoph Horn, Philosophy, University of Bonn, Germany
	(Data) privacy: what is the corona crisis teaching us? by Fernando Luís Barroso da Silva Filho (University of São Paulo, Brazil, School of Law), Carolina Corrêa Giron (University of Triângulo Mineiro, Brazil, Health Department), and Fernando Luís Barroso da Silva (University of São Paulo, Brazil School of Pharmaceutical Sciences)
	The necropolitics of COVID-19: a global south approach to the current pandemic by Christopher J. Lee, History/African Studies, Lafayette University, Easton, Pennsylvania, USA
	Simplification of social life by Rudolf Stichweh, Sociology, Forum Internationale Wissenschaft and Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies, University of Bonn, Germany
	When two crises meet – The COVID-19 pandemic and science denialism by Ernesto Perini-Santos, Philosophy Department, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil
	The robust social market economy – Some thoughts on the corona pandemics by Frank Riedel, Mathematics and Economics, Bielefeld University, Germany
	Mothers in distress. And what does that have to do with the economy? by Mariam Irene Tazi-Preve, Politics, Security, and International Affairs, University of Central Florida
	Lessons learned? – Learning lessons! by Katharina Kohse-Höinghaus, Department of Chemistry, Bielefeld University, Germany
	Home is not what you think by Eva Illouz, Sociology, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, École des hautes études en sciences sociales, Paris
	Coordination by de-integration in pandemic times by Elena Esposito, Sociology, Bielefeld University, Università di Bologna
	Lessons from online teaching, learning and research communications due to COVID-19 related lockdown by Aasiya Qadir (Earth Sciences, University of Kashmir) and Afroz Shah (Physical and Geological Sciences, University of Brunei, Darussalam)
	The democratization and decolonization of academic knowledge in a pandemic and post-pandemic world* by Felipe Carvalho, Philosophy, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil
	My peace depends on your peace: a vision of an alternative world already being built and revealed by the pandemic by Erella Shadmi, Sociology, Social Feminist Activist, Beit Berl College, Israel
	Law in times of pandemics: a forced insertion into the online world and its consequences by Ana Helena German Drumond (Law, Court of Justice of Minas Gerais, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil) and Mariana Damiani Santana (Law, Court of Auditors of Minas Gerais, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil)
	Urban agriculture: a new deal on food supply systems? by Rinaldo Rossi, Geography, Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil
	Memory studies for the future. Remembering (COVID-19) as survival value by Adam F. Kola, Center of Excellence IMSErt, Interacting Minds, Societies, Environments, Nicolaus Copernicus University, Toruń, Poland
	Strengthening of community life as basis for a renewed humanism for the XXI century by Ulisses Barres de Almeida (Brazilian Center for Physics Research, Brazil, and Institute of Advanced Study, Durham University, UK), Daniel Fachin Soares (Economist, CFA, CQF), Marina Massimi (Psychology, Institute of Advance Studies of the University of São Paulo, Brazil), and Ana Lydia Sawaya (Physiology, Institute of Advance Studies, University of São Paulo, Bazil, and UBIAS)
	Utopia as the best way to overcome the corona crisis by Renato Janine Ribeiro, Philosophy, University of São Paulo, Brazil
	Post-covid and multilateralism by Wagner Costa Ribeiro, Institute of Advanced Studies and School of Philosophy, Literature and Human Sciences, São Paulo, Brazil
	Digital culture around the "globe" by Stoyan V. Sgourev, Management Department, ESSEC Business School, Paris
	Obligatory mask, forbidden mask: rigidity and flexibility in the brave new normal* by Wai Yip Ho, Sociology, Islamic Studies, Nantes Institutes for Advanced Study, France, Education University of Hong Kong
	The ways after by José Gracia Bondía, Physics, University of Costa Rica
	The corona crisis as a political stage by Paula Diehl, Political Theory, History of Ideas and Political Culture, University of Kiel, Germany

Call for Essays on the Post-COVID-19 World

How will/should the world change? The corona crisis as an interdisciplinary challenge

Selected contributions