This is Democracy – Episode 87: Coronavirus is Not a War: Problems of Militarism and Public Health

Jeremi and Zachary have a chat on the web with Neta Crawford and Catherine Lutz about the government’s response to Covid-19 pandemic. What are the effects and repercussions of treating the coronavirus like a war enemy to generate awareness, collect responsibility and resources to fight the ongoing pandemic?

Zachary sets the scene with his poem, “Carpet Bombing Disease.”

Neta C. Crawford is Professor and Chair of Political Science, Boston University. She is the author of numerous books, including: Accountability for Killing: Moral Responsibility for Collateral Damage in America’s Post-9/11 Wars (Oxford University Press, 2013) and Argument and Change in World Politics (2002). Neta has written more than two dozen peer reviewed articles on issues of war and peace.2.

Catherine Lutz is the Thomas J. Watson, Jr. Family Professor of Anthropology and International Studies at the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University. Lutz is the author of numerous books, including: War and Health: The Medical Consequences of the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (ed. with A. Mazzarino, 2019), The Bases of Empire (ed., 2009), and Homefront: A Military City and the American 20th Century (2001). Catherine and Neta are co-directors of the “Costs of War” project at Brown University.

They recently published: “Fighting a Virus with the Wrong Tool,” The Hill, 28 March 2020.