Pandemics Are Followed by Mass Social Unrest

2min Snip

00:00

Play full episode

Summary

Transcript

Episode notes

Research finds that pandemics are historically followed by periods of mass social unrest. This is what we might call the most acute moment of the pandemic, not just medically but in terms of the social and political reality around it. The workers going on the offensive right now are certainly driven by the sense that they sacrificed everything to make it through the crisis. Meanwhile, though, teachers and nurses are still very much in the midst of that crisis.

Historian Gabriel Winant discusses The Next Shift: The Fall of Industry and the Rise of Health Care in Rust Belt America. It's a fascinating study of the emergence of the service sector and a new working class out of the wreckage of deindustrialization through the story of the rise and fall of unionized steel in Pittsburgh and its replacement by a massive hospital industry. Listen to my past interview with Winant on the social worlds that make US politics and how that sociality is rooted in the economy, carceral state, social media, religion, and more thedigradio.com/podcast/the-social-question-with-gabriel-winant Support this podcast at Patreon.com/TheDig Check out The After-Normal: Brief, Alphabetical Essays on a Changing Planet, by David Carlin and Nicole Walker rosemetalpress.com/books/the-after-normal