1. The coronavirus pandemic will cause widespread death and suffering that will strain social bonds and the system of production itself. Economists predict a massive economic crisis and unemployment rates unseen since the Great Depression. This opens the door to a radical restructuring of society, but the outcome is not guaranteed.
2. The fascist right will respond with blood and soil nativism. They will rally to defend the supposed purity of the white social body against the “foreign” elements of the virus and other perceived threats. The old, the immunocompromised, the poor, the “non-productive,” and the non-white will be allowed to die to preserve the health of the social body and economy. This is the path towards eco-fascism.
3. Neoliberalism will use this crisis as shock therapy to deepen economic restructuring that enriches the few and immiserates the many. Privatization and commodification will thrive off of the crisis.
4. Profiteers will exploit this moment to make untold sums of money. Petty hoarders and resellers are only the tip of the iceberg; the rich will take advantage of the plunging stock market and the widespread destruction of small businesses to cheaply buy up large swathes of the economy and reshape it in their image.
5. Capitalists will attempt to further commodify our social relations in the guise of tools to overcome the isolation of social distancing. They are already developing new apps that will monetize connections between homebound people. Commodified social connections will deepen our sense of alienation and despair.
6. Technological innovations also have the potential to transform our social relations in a decommodified fashion. Online mutual aid groups, free apps that facilitate neighborhood organizing, and free online live concerts are the first signs of an emergent paradigm. An online-coordinated rent strike will lead to a national rent freeze; this will be a major step towards the decommodification of housing.
7. In the face of callous state inaction, a new wave of mutual aid is emerging across the world. Online mutual aid groups will organically develop into systems of care and survival from below that have the potential to replace the functions of the state and market economy.
8. Against the alienation and atomization of social distancing, we will regain social cohesion through sustained individual and collective effort. Liberatory art, music, and poetry will be shared for free, producing a new culture of hope and possibility. Coronavirus will help us regain a sense of the social bonds that make us human.
9. The necessary decoupling of work from survival paves the way for a Universal Basic Income. We should embrace this moment as the beginning of the transition into a UBI-supported radical Green New Deal that points the way beyond capitalism towards an ecological society.
10. This crisis will force society to change. We may go further down the path of authoritarianism, ruthless competition, and ecological catastrophe. But we may instead embrace our inclinations towards joyful collaboration, mutual aid, and ecological stewardship. Strengthening these latter tendencies will guide us through the crisis and provide the basis for new forms of life.
