ABSTRACT
From an historical perspective public space has been subjected to the control of the state. It has been used as a means to control those that are considered as needing to be kept in the proper place and, therefore, to maintain social order. However, public space is often used by those who are marginalized in the society who have limited private space for a variety of functions including making a livelihood, private living necessities, and recreation to name a few. With the rise of the COVID-19 pandemic the use of public space was severely restricted in an attempt to curb the pandemic. However, these restrictions on public space have revealed the ways in which spatial inequality is exacerbated in the Caribbean. This chapter addresses the ways in which emergency space management measures adopted by the state to address COVID-19 affect the use of space amongst the poor and marginalized. Using a thematic analysis of newspaper articles from two main daily periodicals in Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica, the chapter assesses the ways in which restrictions on public space creates spatial inequality. The chapter shows that the COVID-19 policies that have been enacted in Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica have resulted in a clear disproportionate burden on the poor and marginalized in these countries. It shows that the use of spatial, particularly public space is multi-dimensional in how it is used and control by different stakeholders. The chapter argues that this is not accidental, but rather part of a larger systemic process that is grounded in the history of coloniality. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.