Thursday, 2 April 2020

WILL CORONAVIRUS RESET OUR THINKING ON DEMOCRACY, LIBERTY, DATA AND SURVEILLANCE?



I note the issues of democracy, liberty, data and some of the government and civil choices now being made about security, surveillance and citizenship that will affect us now and potentially forever?

It may be suggested that more authoritarian government or cultures have been able to enforce and cope with lockdown better than others. But there is a counter-argument that the community spirit and collaboration is greater in those counties of civil liberties.

Could Britain become like George Orwell’s 1984 with drones patrolling the streets or embrace more socialist concepts like universal income as espoused in Utopia for Realists: And How We Can Get There by Rutger Bregman

Maybe we will see a new social contract as suggested in Out of the Wreckage: A New Politics for an Age of Crisis by George Monbiot or as advocated by Robert Peston in his book WTF?: What have we done? Why did it happen? How do we take back control?

Brexit seems tame in its impact and its implications compared to where we are now.

In his book How To Fix The Future, Andrew Keen looks at how different governments approach the use of data for civil purposes. In his best seller books (Homo Deus  and 21 Lessons for 21st Century) Yuval Noah Harari also explores the choices and future scenarios that may arise as a result of the decisions we take.

The papers say We will have to accept the curtailment of our liberty to vanquish the coronavirus in one breath and Britain has traded individual liberty for a terrifying state omnishambles

Some try to take a neutral stance: Liberty and the Coronavirus: Not An Either/Or Proposition

Now might be a useful time to engage in a debate about the world we want to return to when this is all over.

Feedback and comments welcome.

#LetsResetNormal

LINKS

We will have to accept the curtailment of our liberty to vanquish the coronavirus

Britain has traded individual liberty for a terrifying state omnishambles

Liberty and the Coronavirus: Not An Either/Or Proposition



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