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Whose Post-Pandemic Century?

Dec 29, 2020 Bill Emmott

After almost a year of living under the cloud of the pandemic, it is clear that even poor Asian countries managed COVID-19 far better than the United States and Europe. But whether 2020 thus marked the beginning of a new "Asian Century" still remains to be seen.

LONDON – In the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was common to divide countries and their responses according to their political systems, with many attributing China’s success in controlling the virus to its authoritarianism. As of late 2020, however, it is clear that the real dividing line is not political but geographical. Regardless of whether a country is democratic or authoritarian, an island or continental, Confucian or Buddhist, communitarian or individualistic, if it is East Asian, Southeast Asian, or Australasian, it has managed COVID-19 better than any European or North American country.

While this line is not exactly hemispheric, it is close enough to be suggestive. Even Asia’s worst performers (in public-health terms) – such as the Philippines and Indonesia – controlled the pandemic more effectively than did Europe’s biggest and wealthiest countries. Notwithstanding reasonable doubts about the quality and accuracy of the reported mortality data in the case of the Philippines (and India), the fact remains that you were much likelier to die of COVID-19 in 2020 if you were European or American than if you were Asian.

Comprehensive, interdisciplinary research is urgently needed to explain these performance differentials. Because much of our current understanding is anecdotal and insufficiently pan-regional, it is vulnerable to political exploitation and distortion. To help all countries prepare for future biological threats, several specific questions need to be explored. First is the extent to which the experience of SARS, MERS, Avian flu, and other disease outbreaks in many Asian countries left a legacy of health-system preparedness and public receptiveness to anti-transmission messaging.

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j. von Hettlingen Jan 2, 2021

Bill Emmott says East Asian, Southeast Asian, or Australasian countries - even the poor ones - had managed Covid-19 far better than the US and Europe. Some of these countries share borders with and receive frequent travelers from China, the original epicentre of the virus. But their response - a combination of early travel restrictions, mass testing, contact tracing, and strict quarantine measures helped avoid mass outbreaks and keep death toll low. The recent surge in cases in countries praised for their management of the pandemic, are now struggling to contain growing outbreaks.
The author says, despite this remarkable achievement, it is still early to assume that the year 2020 “marked the beginning of a new ‘Asian Century’.” It remains to be seen what these countries’ “relative success…will mean for public policymaking and geopolitics after the pandemic.” Many of them have a strong state with an effective bureaucratic, coercive apparatus, and a political culture based on Confucianism, which values hierarchy.
“If future historians want a precise date for when the “Asian Century” began, they may be tempted to choose 2020, just as the US publisher Henry Luce dated the ‘American Century’ from the onset of World War II,” according to the author. History shows that political power is measured by economic strength. Today, Asia is in the same position as the US at the beginning of the 20th century: an economic giant, but a political dwarf.
World War II transformed the US, whose rapid rise in power and influence laid the foundation of the today’s global liberal order - Pax Americana - making the country the bastion of freedom and democracy, shining the light of its noble ideals around the world and championing those ideals whenever they came under threat. Not only has Trump abandoned those ideals, he has also neglected many issues, from Covid-19 vaccines to trade deals to climate change, prompting speculations that Asia might step into the vaccum and claim political leadership.
According to the author, “this particular comparison suggests that any such judgment may be premature. After all, Luce’s America was an individual superpower. Emerging victorious from the war, it would go on to claim and define its era (in competition with another superpower, the Soviet Union). The Asian Century, by contrast, will feature an entire continent comprising a wide range of countries,” that remain fractured politically. With the rise of competition for global influence, few Asian countries want to see China dominate their region.
That Asian countries’ “economic performance in 2020 did not match the success of their pandemic response” shows how independent our global economy is. “While Vietnam, China, and Taiwan have beaten the rest of the world in terms of GDP growth, the United States has not fared too badly, despite its failure to manage the virus. With forecasts pointing to a 3.6% contraction for the year, the US is in better shape than every European economy, as well as Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, and others in Asia.” Unlike the US, “many Asian economies are more exposed to trade and travel bans, which cut deeply into the tourism industry.”
Despite China’s success in managing the pandemic and boosting growth better than the West, “it has neither found nor really sought a political or diplomatic advantage from the crisis.” Instead it flexes its military and economic musles to bully neighbours and other countries into submission. Chinese leaders seem not interested in “trying to build an Asian network of friends and supporters,” who turn to the US for support to counter Beijing’s aggression.
“How China approaches the issue of international debt restructurings – especially those connected with its Belt and Road Initiative – will be a key test in 2021.” Nevertheless the global pandemic has seriously affected the infrastructure programme. China has scaled back some plans after several countries sought to review, cancel or scale down commitments, citing concerns over costs, erosion of sovereignty and corruption. Poor countries are likely to need “debt restructuring or write-downs.”
While it may be too soon to “announce a new historical epoch” that features Asian century, the US and the rest of the world will need to get their act together - “from international fiancé to sociopolitical stability” - if they want to restore the status quo ante.
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Edwin Hoffman Dec 29, 2020

“Magic scarecrows”

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-cambodia-scarecrow-idUSKBN2860LL
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william etheridge Dec 29, 2020

I am no medical expert but immunity relating to proximity to source must surely in some way be a major factor because the disparity in death rates is so high. Thus these SARS viruses all emanate from that neighbourhood.
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