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The coronavirus pandemic that broke out in 2019 has finally calmed down in China, after the bungling occasioned by the iron hand of lockdown. But beginning in March 2020, the disaster spread abroad, and at present there is no end in sight. Discussions of the changes the pandemic brings to the world, and how “plagues change history,” are a hot topic everywhere.
In this book, Prof. Qin Hui offers a stunning reflection on the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on political institutions, which are well worth pondering for both China and the West. China, with its “low human rights advantage,” has achieved success in imposing coercive lockdowns that got the virus under control after the disastrous outbreak in Wuhan, but it will be a challenge to prevent the normalization of emergency measures from worsening human right conditions in normal times. The West, handicapped by its “high human rights (dis)advantage,” must learn how a democracy can efficiently enter a state of emergency and put an end to these measures at the proper time.
Qin Hui is Retired Professor in Department of History, Tsinghua University, and is now Adjunct Professor in the Department of Government and Public Administration, the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
David Ownby is Professor of History and Director of the Center of East Asian Studies at the University of Montreal.