Author Archives: Julius Gavroche

Greece: The politics of exception in times of the pandemic

Greece is often presented as an example to follow in the control of the COVID-19 pandemic, having kept numbers of infection and death comparatively low. (the Guardian) What is so often ignored or passed over in these celebratory judgements is … Continue reading

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Raúl Zibechi: Mapping militant mutual aid

Raúl Zibechi has been actively chronicling examples of mutual aid throughout latin america that are of enormous importance for the understanding of what is politically possible in times of crisis and pandemic. His work can be followed in spanish at … Continue reading

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Albert Camus: The plague is the concern of all

Reflections on our contemporary Albert Camus on times of the pandemic … No longer merely metaphor: Re-reading The Plague by Albert Camus Kristian Williams (threewayfight, 28/03/2020) Albert Camus’ novel The Plague offers a portrait of a town under quarantine, ravaged by an epidemic. … Continue reading

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Arundhati Roy: Our task is to disable the engine

The coronavirus pandemic has brought the machine of capitalism to a grinding halt. Arundhati Roy (Progressive International, 02/05/2020) While the human race is momentarily incarcerated, and even as a record-size hole opens in the ozone layer above the Arctic, the … Continue reading

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Giorgio Agamben: Biosecurity and politics

Sharing the continuing reflections of Giorgio Agamben on the COVID-19 pandemic …

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Lebanon: Chronicles of revolution in times of a pandemic

From Lundi Matin #241, 04/05/2020 … Since October 17, 2019, Lebanon has been living at the rhythm of an uprising targeting both the political class and a moribund economic regime. As elsewhere, the spread of the virus and the health … Continue reading

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Nietzschean reflections in times of the pandemic

Love children especially, for they too are sinless like the angels; they live to soften and purify our hearts and, as it were, to guide us. Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov Innocence is the child, and forgetfulness, a new beginning, a … Continue reading

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Tomás Ibáñez: The State and the pandemic

You might as well be hung for deathAs breaking a machine–So now my Lad, your sword unsheathAnd make it sharp and keen- We are ready now your cause to joinWhenever you may call;So make foul blood run clear & fineOf … Continue reading

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COVID-19: Translating a pandemic politically (3)

The new experience that has replaced dignified suffering is artificially prolonged, opaque, depersonalized maintenance. Ivan Illich, Medical Nemesis I If political sovereignty is defined by the decision on the exception (Carl Schmitt), on what is to be excluded from and … Continue reading

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Mapping our dystopia

We continue to share translations from the not bored collective which are generously forwarded to us. Ongoing reflections on the politics of a pandemic …

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