COVID-19

In this episode, Professor Poast discusses international cooperation in times of war and in times of pandemics, as well as the widening gap between national and local government.

Possibly the most disagreeable consequence of the crisis would be the expanding role of the state to the detriment of individual liberties and privacy. Cutting across political ideologies, governments in countries like China, South Korea, Singapore, Italy, Israel, and Mexico, are harnessing surveillance-camera footage, mobile and credit card data to trace the movements of people and establish virus transmission chains.

A number of criminal groups across Latin America are ordering ceasefires and exerting control over local communities as fears of the coronavirus sweep across the region, raising questions about how these groups will use this crisis to further their legitimacy and power.