Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Linking Experience and Reflection

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
The Covid-19 Pandemic and Global Bioethics

Part of the book series: Advancing Global Bioethics ((AGBIO,volume 18))

  • 285 Accesses

Abstract

How Covid-19 is imagined in public discourse is examined in this chapter. Policies are commonly presented as a war against an invisible enemy. The problematic aspects of such militarized language are pointed out, and an alternative framing is offered, emphasizing connectedness and balance as appropriate metaphors to interpret the experience of the pandemic. Finally, the notion of common home is introduced. This has the advantage to articulate the shared rather than individualistic dimension of pandemic experience, and to relate it to the global threat of climate change.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
eBook
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 119.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 119.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  1. See, for example, Rajandran, K. 2020. ‘A long battle ahead’: Malaysian and Singaporean prime ministers employ metaphors for Covid-19. GEMA Online Journal of Language Studies 17 (2): 163–176; United Nations. 2020. COVID-19 Response. This war needs a war-time plan to fight it; Euronews. 2020. We need a ‘war economy’ to deal with COVID-19 crisis, UN chief Antonio Guterres tells Euronews. Euronews Online.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Zhang, L. 2021. The origins of Covid-19. China and global capitalism. Stanford: Stanford Briefs.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  3. See, for example, Adam, M. 2020. An enemy to fight or someone to live with, how Covid-19 is metaphorically described in Indonesian media discourse. Conference paper, July, 2nd National Webinar on English Linguistics and Literature; Wicke, P., and N.M. Bolognesi. 2020. Framing COVID-19: How we conceptualize and discuss the pandemic on Twitter. PLoS ONE 15 (9): e0240010.

    Google Scholar 

  4. Pasquier, P., A. Luft, J. Gillard, et al. 2020. How do we fight Covid-19? Military medical actions in the war against the Covid-19 pandemic in France. BMJ Military Health; Opillard, F., A. Palle, and L. Michelis. 2020. Discourse and strategic use of the military in France and Europe in the Covid-19 crisis. Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie 111 (3): 239–259.

    Google Scholar 

  5. McNeill, W.H. 1998. Plagues and people. New York: Anchor Books.

    Google Scholar 

  6. Walker, I.F. 2020. Beyond the military metaphor. Medicine Anthropology Theory 7 (2): 261–271; Cipolletta, S., and M.C. Ortu. 2020. Covid-19: Common constructions of the pandemic and their implications. Journal of Constructivist Psychology; Bates, B.R. 2020. The (in)appropriateness of the WAR metaphor in response to SARS-CoV-2: A rapid analysis of Donald J. Trump’s rhetoric. Frontiers in Communication 5: 50; De Waal, A. 2021. New pandemics, old politics. Two hundred years of war on disease and its alternatives. Cambridge: Polity Press.

    Google Scholar 

  7. “Our fears and efforts were targeted on individual germs, and not on the ecologies that generate them or the society and economy that enable them to spread.” De Waal, New pandemics, old politics, 13.

    Google Scholar 

  8. Rohela, P., A. Bhan, D. Ravindranath, et al. 2020. Must there be a ‘war’ against coronavirus? Indian Journal of Medical Ethics 5 (3).

    Google Scholar 

  9. Buruma, I. 2020. Virus as metaphor. New York Times, March 28.

    Google Scholar 

  10. Isaacs, D., and A. Priesz. 2021. Covid-19 and the metaphor of war. Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health 57: 6–8.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Fairbanks, E. 2020. A pandemic is not a war. HuffPost, April 14.

    Google Scholar 

  12. Bell, A., and T. Gift. 2020. 200,00 losses later. Some lessons for the ‘wartime president’. Newsweek, September 22.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Chapman, C.M., and D.S. Miller. 2020. From metaphor to militarized response: The social implications of ‘we are at war with Covid-19’ – Crisis, disaster, and pandemics yet to come. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 40 (9/10): 1107–1124.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. This is the reason that De Waal uses the term ‘pandemy.’ It more adequately refers to a societal crisis, including ecological and societal pathologies. De Waal, New pandemics, old politics, 15.

    Google Scholar 

  15. “Life is not only a bloody confrontation: it also depends on myriad living interactions…” Ryan, F. 2020. Virussphere. London: William Collins, 178; WHO. 2020. Coronavirus Outbreak (COVID-19): WHO Update (13 May 2020). United Nations. 13 May.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Craig, D. 2020. Pandemic and its metaphors: Sontag revisited in the Covid-19 era. European Journal of Cultural Studies 23 (6): 1025–1032.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Rohela, Bhan, Ravindranath, et al. 2020 Must there be a ‘war’ against coronavirus? Indian Journal of Medical Ethics 3: 222–226.

    Google Scholar 

  18. Sabucedo, J-M., M. Alzate, and D. Hur. 2020. Covid-19 and the metaphor of war. Revista de Psicologia Social/International Journal of Social Psychology 35 (3).

    Google Scholar 

  19. Hassoun, N. 2020. What is COVAX and why does it matter for getting vaccines to developing nations? The Conversation, October 2.

    Google Scholar 

  20. Miller, F.G. 2020. Pandemic language. Hastings Center, July 2020.

    Google Scholar 

  21. Rose, J. 2020. Pointing the finger. London Review of Books 42 (9): 3, 6–8, 10.

    Google Scholar 

  22. De Beaumont Foundation. 2020. Poll: New national conversation about Covid-19 urgently needed to overcome partisan divide and save lives. November 30.

    Google Scholar 

  23. Shaw, D. 2020. The many meanings of ‘stay safe’ in a pandemic: Sympathy, duty, and threat. Journal of Medical Ethics Blog, May 13.

    Google Scholar 

  24. Bedyński, W. 2020. Liminality: Black Death 700 years later. What lessons are for us from the medieval pandemic? Society Register 4 (3): 129–144.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Thornhill, C., and R. Miron. 2020. Karl Jaspers. In The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, ed. E.N. Zalta.

    Google Scholar 

  26. Carrington, D. 2021. World leaders ‘ignoring’ role of destruction of nature in causing pandemics. The Guardian, June 4.

    Google Scholar 

  27. George, D.R., E.R. Whitehouse, and P.J. Whitehouse. 2016. Asking more of our metaphors: Narrative strategies to end the ‘war on Alzheimer’s’ and humanize cognitive aging. American Journal of Bioethics 16 (10): 22–24.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Walker, Beyond the military metaphor, 265, 268; Nie, J-B., A. Gilbertson, M. de Roubaux, et al. 2016. Healing without waging war: Beyond military metaphors in medicine and HIV cure research. American Journal of Bioethics 16 (10): 3–11.

    Google Scholar 

  29. Marcel, G. 1962. Homo viator. Introduction to a metaphysic of hope, 23. New York: Harper & Row.

    Google Scholar 

  30. ———. 1984. Reply to John E. Smith. In The philosophy of Gabriel Marcel, ed. P.A. Schilpp and L.E. Hahn, 350–353. La Salle: Open Court.

    Google Scholar 

  31. Bruni, L. 2012. The wound and the blessing. Economics, relationships, and happiness. Hyde Park/New York: New City Press.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Sayer, A. 2011. Why things matter to people. Social science, values and ethical life. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  33. In the words of Michael Sandel: “The common good is about how we live together in community. It’s about the ethical ideals we strive for together, the benefits and burdens we share, the sacrifices we make for one another. It’s about the lessons we learn from one another about how to live a good and decent life.” Quoted in Friedman, T. 2020. Finding the ‘common good’ in a pandemic. New York Times, March 24.

    Google Scholar 

  34. Ten Have, H. 2019. Wounded planet. How declining biodiversity endangers health and how bioethics can help. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  35. Hinchliffe, S. 2015. More than one world, more than one health: Re-configuring interspecies health. Social Science & Medicine 129: 28–35.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  36. Potter, V.R. 1971. Bioethics. Bridge to the future. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall; Potter, V.R. 1988. Global bioethics. Building on the Leopold legacy. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  37. Ten Have, Wounded Planet, 44ff.

    Google Scholar 

  38. Nie, Gilbertson, de Roubaux, et al. Healing without waging war.

    Google Scholar 

  39. World Health Organization. 2020. Coronavirus outbreak (COVID-19), Update (13 May).

    Google Scholar 

  40. Benezra, A., J. DeStefano, and J.I. Gordon. 2012. Anthropology of microbes. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 109 (17): 6378–6381.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  41. Oswick, C., D. Grant, and R. Oswick. 2020. Categories, crossroads, control, connectedness, and change: A metaphorical exploration of Covid-19. The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science 56 (3): 284–288.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  42. American Red Cross. 2003. Fact sheet on shelter-in-place.

    Google Scholar 

  43. Mallet, S. 2004. Understanding home. A critical review of the literature. Sociological Review 52 (1): 62–89.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  44. “Home is lived in the tension between the given and the chosen, then and now, here and there.” Mallet, Understanding home, 80.

    Google Scholar 

  45. Smith, S.G. 1994. The essential qualities of a home. Journal of Environmental Psychology 14: 31–46; Moore, J. 2000. Placing home in context. Journal of Environmental Psychology 20: 207–217.

    Google Scholar 

  46. Bachelard, G. 2014. The poetics of space. New York: Penguin Books, 28. According to Levinas: “To exist…means to dwell.” Levinas, E. 1991. Totality and infinity: An essay on exteriority. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 156. See also: Dekkers, W. 2011. Dwelling, house and home: Towards a home-led perspective on dementia care. Medicine Health Care and Philosophy 14: 291–300.

    Google Scholar 

  47. Selâl Şengör, A.M. 1991. Our home, the planet earth. Diogenes 39 (155): 25–51.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  48. Rio Declaration on Environment and Development.

    Google Scholar 

  49. The Earth Charter.

    Google Scholar 

  50. Francis, Pope. 2005. Encyclical letter Laudato Si’ – On care for our common home. Rome: Vatican.

    Google Scholar 

  51. Thibodeau, P.H., C. McPherson Frantz, and M. Berretta. 2017. The earth is our home: Systemic metaphors to redefine our relationship with nature. Climatic Change 142 (1): 287–300.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  52. Jacobson, K. 2009. A developed nature: A phenomenological account of the experience of home. Continental Philosophy Review 42: 355–373.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  53. Ten Have, H. 2020. Sheltering at our common home. Journal of Bioethical Inquiry 17: 525–529.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  54. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 2018. Global warming of 1.5°C. Cham: IPCC.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Bioethics, Anahuac University, Mexico City, Mexico

    Henk ten Have

Authors
  1. Henk ten Have
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2022 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

ten Have, H. (2022). Linking Experience and Reflection. In: The Covid-19 Pandemic and Global Bioethics. Advancing Global Bioethics, vol 18. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91491-2_6

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation