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Pandemic precarity
Author(s) -
Cassiman Ann,
Eriksen Thomas Hylland,
Meinert Lotte
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
anthropology today
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.419
H-Index - 24
eISSN - 1467-8322
pISSN - 0268-540X
DOI - 10.1111/1467-8322.12738
Subject(s) - precarity , everyday life , sociology , pandemic , improvisation , inequality , informal sector , precarious work , gender studies , political economy , covid-19 , political science , economic growth , work (physics) , law , economics , medicine , art , mathematical analysis , mechanical engineering , mathematics , disease , engineering , pathology , infectious disease (medical specialty) , visual arts
This editorial highlights how the Covid‐19 pandemic has magnified precarity as a global life condition. At the same time, it has also emphasized inequality and exposed how some lives are more precarious than others. Those working in the so‐called informal economy have been proportionally harder hit. In sub‐Saharan Africa, where most of the economy is informal, many rely on improvisation tactics for everyday survival and well‐being. Yet, in order to grasp these everyday tactics, the authors suggest that we move beyond two stereotypical ideas about Africa: the suffering and the resilient precariat. The discourse on precarity is often misleading and patronizing, pointing to the ways humans either suffer or transcend victimhood. In everyday lives, humans devise tactics — within larger structures and strategies beyond our control, such as the global pandemic — for making a living and creating lives worth living.