Beyond the COVID-19 Pandemic: Gauging Neoliberal Capitalism and the Unipolar World Order

ABSTRACT

This paper argues that the COVID-19 outbreak is a “nodal point” that will lead to certain irreversible changes in the world economic and political order in the near future. These changes, however, will not only be an outcome of the current health pandemic, but also of the economic and political pandemics that have grown worse over a period of time. This paper identifies two far-reaching consequences of the accumulating pandemics that have the potential to lead the world towards a qualitatively better future. The first is the possible death of neoliberal capitalism that will lead to higher state intervention. The second is the end of the unipolar imperialist world order and subsequent emergence of a bipolar world with a rising China as a probable occupant of the non-imperialist pole. Both these outcomes are subject to the people's resistance for a better future, and China’s alacrity in undermining the hegemony of imperialist-led globalization.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• neoliberal capitalism
• China
• unipolar world order
• new world order

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to the editors and reviewers of International Critical Thought for their holistic approach to the paper. I am also grateful to Prof. Ronki Ram, Department of Political Science, Panjab University, Chandigarh (India) for his valuable suggestions and comments on an earlier draft of the paper. I have also benefited from telephone discussion on the issue with my friends Dr. Inderjeet Singh and Beant Singh (Research Scholar, Punjabi University, Patiala). All the remaining errors are my own.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on Contributor

Paramjit Singh teaches in the Department of Economics at Panjab University in Chandigarh, India. His recent articles include “The Economic Consequences of Prime Minister Modi” in Studies in Political Economy (2020) and “Political Economy of Capitalist Development in Punjab’s Agriculture” in Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy (2020). He has recently co-edited Global Political Economy: A Critique of Contemporary Capitalism published by Aakar books, Delhi (India).

Notes

1 The text in brackets has been added to the original words of Marx and Engels.