ABSTRACT
Initially portrayed as the great equalizer, the COVID-19 pandemic has proved anything but. This essay recounts the sobering social disparities and vulnerabilities that the pandemic has exposed, especially when it comes to the inequalities that are baked into existing membership regimes, before turning to narratives of hope and democratic renewal. My discussion shines a spotlight on the relationship between borders, (im)mobility, and struggles for recognition and inclusion that have long been central to the practice of citizenship. Focusing on pathways to the acquisition of full membership status for those who are currently denied it, I will deploy logics and policies that have already begun to take shape in different parts of the world, with the goal of amplifying their effects and multiplying their scale. I identify three possible trajectories for postpandemic recovery, two of which offer ways to enhance equality of status and public standing by enlarging the circle of membership: first, through contribution (or what I will term jus contribuere), and second, by highlighting what we might call solidarity in place. The third reaction, which we might call the stratification of membership, pulls in the opposite direction by sharply redrawing the lines - legal, economic, social - that have distinguished insiders from outsiders, and exacerbated patterns of stratification and inequality of status and opportunity that predate the pandemic. Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.
ABSTRACT
»Der Körper als Grenze: Eine neue Ära«. COVID-19 has reminded us of the significance of borders. In 1989, with the fall of the Berlin Wall, many predicted that sealed gates would soon become relics of a bygone era. Today, we find a different reality. Instead of disappearing, borders are transforming. In this article, we build upon the shifting border logic to explore how responses to the global pandemic have accelerated processes of detachment of mobility control from a fixed territorial marker. From global travel bans to mandating pre-arrival proof of a negative test result taken within 48 or 72 hours prior to departure to requiring digital registration of a passenger’s travel history to enforcing strict post-arrival mandatory quarantine orders that arrest mobility, the shifting border paradigm has provided a template for policymakers to respond to a mounting global crisis. In addition to regulating movement across international borders and within countries, we trace the surprising return of subnational and inter-regional division lines in managing mobility, the erosion of the once taken for granted right to return to one’s home country, and the spatial and legal techniques used to block refugees from reaching terra firma during the pandemic. Next, we critically evaluate the authorization given under emergency regulations to deploy novel biometric and AI technologies, big data, and predictive algorithms to surveil moving bodies at real time and reprimand those deemed to have breached their quarantine or related governmental emergency measures. While drastic times call for drastic measures, techniques of movement control that “scan” and trace our bodies raise serious questions about justice, fairness, and the risk of discrimination, which may well remain with us even long after the pandemic is over. © 2021, GESIS - Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences. All rights reserved.