Most governments around the world have been failing for decades to implement the health, tax and labour policies that would reduce the gap between the rich and the poor and make economies more resilient to shocks such as COVID-19, a new Oxfam report has found.

Analysis from Oxfam and Development Finance International (DFI) published on Wednesday blamed governmental policy failures for the depth of the coronavirus crisis and the economic fallout it has caused.

“[Governments] have been failing to spend enough on health. They have been failing to protect their workforce with things like sick pay. They have been failing to tax the rich, and instead let them off the hook,” Chema Vera, Oxfam’s acting executive director, told Al Jazeera.

Just 26 out of 158 countries were spending the recommended 15 percent of their national budgets on the health sector before the coronavirus pandemic, according to data from the Commitment to Reducing Inequality Index (CRII).

In 103 countries, at least one-third of the workforce has no access to basic labour protections, such as sick pay. The index also noted that only 53 countries have social protection schemes against job loss and illness, and they covered only 22 percent of the global workforce.

“The coronavirus crisis has laid bare the reality that the vast majority of humanity exists only just above the poverty line, only one paycheck from destitution,” Vera said.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, India spent just 4 percent of its budget on health services. Now it is reeling from one of the world’s worst COVID-19 outbreaks and only half of its population has access to basic healthcare.

“Even before COVID-19, inequalities were not only large, they were growing in the areas that have determined the ability to respond to the economic and social effects of the crisis,” Pedro Conceicao, director of the human development report office at UN Development Programme, told Al Jazeera.

“And so this gap, while important last year, is becoming critical,” he added.

Worldwide, women are bearing the brunt of the economic slowdown and mass unemployment.  Earning less at less secure jobs pre-pandemic, women in the COVID-era have also had to grapple with unpaid childcare work and a global surge in domestic violence.

The report also notes that nearly half of the countries on the index do not have adequate legislation to address rape. And 10 countries, including Singapore and Sierra Leone, have no laws on equal pay or gender discrimination in the workplace.

The poor are getting poorer, even in rich countries

Even countries that rank high on the index, such as Germany, Denmark, Norway and the United Kingdom, are backtracking on critical policies that have helped reduce inequality for decades.

Denmark has promoted taxation policies that have increased inequality. In the last decade, income growth has stagnated for everyday citizens and cuts to education have caused great concern. The richest 10 percent now own nearly half of the country’s total wealth.

“Governments must redistribute wealth dramatically and implement policies that fight inequality – policies that ensure a permanent exit to poverty, even in the face of shocks like COVID-19,” Oxfam’s Vera told Al Jazeera.

Analysis of the United States response to the coronavirus pandemic has only compounded the existing concerns of Oxfam experts. In the US, COVID-19 has disproportionately affected Black and Latinx communities, reflecting inequities in healthcare, housing and employment.

“The gap between rich and poor, widened by COVID-19, will continue to grow,” Vera said. “It will increase political unrest and popular anger. Inequality is not inevitable, it is a policy choice, and if governments choose further increases in inequality this will have disastrous consequences.”

Source: Al Jazeera

The coronavirus pandemic has killed over a million people globally and disrupted healthcare and political systems, economies, social bonds and religious practices.

What can South Africa’s Bill of Rights and international human rights treaties contribute to coronavirus responses and recovery strategies in the country and globally?

My central argument is that human rights provide tools to help states build fairer societies and economies. Such societies will be more resilient to future shocks.

A human rights-based approach to the pandemic is based on values. It prioritises the most disadvantaged and vulnerable and it is holistic. It also highlights international assistance and cooperation.

Value-based approach

The values of human dignity, equality and freedom lie at the heart of human rights and are the founding values of South Africa’s constitution. These values require the state and private actors to recognise that every life is equally valuable. Everyone should have civil and political freedoms – and the economic, social and cultural means – to develop to their full potential.

Governments can promote these values by acknowledging people’s agency. People should have meaningful opportunities to participate in response and recovery programmes. For example, a broad range of civil society bodies must get a chance to shape the budgetary decisions underlying economic recovery.

The goal of all response measures should be to create an environment in which all can live in dignity without excessive inequalities on grounds of race, gender and socio-economic status.

Setting priorities

Human rights help governments set priorities in responding to the pandemic. People who are most disadvantaged and vulnerable should be the central focus.

Pandemic and lockdowns have had the most severe impact on people living in poverty. In South Africa, that overwhelmingly means black people. Among them are people in overcrowded informal settlements without adequate water or the space to comply with social distance guidelines. Also harshly affected are workers in the informal sector, migrant workers, refugees and asylum seekers. Many have not been able to access economic relief.

Because traditional gender roles persist, women have had to bear the biggest burden of child care, homeschooling and domestic work while trying to keep their jobs.

Human rights require states to put the needs of such groups first when it comes to budgets, laws, policies and programmes. Economic reforms and other pandemic responses should be based on a systematic human rights impact assessment.

Interdependence and accountability

The third contribution of human rights is that they oblige governments to develop a holistic, integrated response to the pandemic.

South Africa’s constitution and international human rights law recognise that all human rights – civil, political, economic, social, cultural and environmental – are interdependent and interrelated. This means the right to life and health must be protected through science-based measures. Governments must also protect people’s access to socio-economic rights like food, social security and education.

Countries without strong public healthcare systems, food distribution networks, access to water, social protection programmes or affordable, equitable internet access have struggled to cope with the pandemic. South Africa must strengthen its investments in socioeconomic rights and in the public service that is responsible for delivering these to people.

As the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has stated, economic, social and cultural rights are indispensable to pandemic strategies. Establishing universal healthcare systems and comprehensive social protection programmes will improve the resilience of societies to future shocks.

The pandemic has also shown the importance of civil and political rights and freedoms. Many countries, including South Africa, have adopted exceptional measures to curb the virus. These have limited or even suspended, rights such as freedom of movement, assembly, expression and religion.

Lockdown measures have sometimes been enforced with heavy-handed action by security forces. People in informal settlements have borne the brunt of such abuses of power and violations of human rights.

While restrictions on civil and political liberties may be necessary to protect lives, human rights law requires that they go no further than what’s strictly necessary to achieve this goal. It also requires safeguards to prevent abuses.

By respecting people’s democratic rights and freedoms, and ensuring that limitations are not excessive, states help preserve trust in the legitimacy of the measures to contain the virus. Thus compliance is likely to be higher.

Effective remedies for human rights violations also help promote accountable government. A good example is the recent High Court judgment ordering the South African government to ensure that school meals are provided to all qualifying children, whether they are attending school or not.

International assistance and cooperation

The final principle that international human rights law, particularly the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, recognises is that of international assistance and cooperation. This principle acknowledges that the fates of all are intertwined. As UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has noted:

If one country fails in its efforts to control the spread of the virus, all countries are at risk. The world is only as strong as the weakest health system.

International assistance and cooperation include ensuring universal access to the benefits of scientific advances relating to COVID-19 such as in testing, treatments and vaccines. It also includes debt relief and development aid where economies have been devastated. The principle promotes global solidarity, which will be vital in efforts to beat the current and future pandemics.

Human rights require states to respond to the pandemic in ways that reduce inequalities and poverty and promote participation, accountability and international solidarity. They can help South Africa and all countries to emerge better prepared for future crises.

Source: The Conversation

From the mid-2000s onwards, the digital revolution raised hopes of democratic transformation and strengthening in Africa. But it hasn’t quite turned out like that. Now, almost a decade after the “Arab Spring”, techno-optimism has given way to techno-pessimism.

African leaders have proved able to blunt the transformative potential of smartphones through censorship and internet shutdowns. When the internet is on, social media attracts more attention for spreading fake news than preventing election rigging.

What was once thought of as “liberation technology” has turned out to be remarkably compatible with the maintenance of the status quo? Or has it? Does this more pessimistic reading overlook genuine progress?

A new publication I co-edited with Lisa Garbe – Decoding #DigitalDemocracy in Africa – draws together the latest research on the extent to which digital technology has changed Africa … and the ways in which Africa is changing digital technology.

The articles show that we should not miss the wood for the trees: despite the disappointment, digital technology has had profound impacts on African politics and society. But, they also highlight how much more needs to be known about digital technology on the continent.

Digital access and inclusion

A lot of recent analysis has focused on the digital divide in Africa, and the many people excluded from online access by poverty and lack of coverage.

Yet researchers have also found that closing this divide cannot be achieved by cheaper technology alone. Using digital technology to access information and resources is only possible when a set of political, legal, and economic conditions are in place.

For example, the content that citizens can access increasingly depends on giant tech companies, especially for poorer citizens. In his contribution on Facebook’s Free Basics - a service that provides basic online services without data charges - Toussaint Nothias explains that tech corporations’ dominant position enables them to shape how individuals use the internet under the pretence of making it more affordable.

This raises tough questions about whether multinational companies engage ethically in Africa. As Julie Owono’s contribution points out, Facebook has been accused of “dumping” products such as Free Basics, stymieing the production of local alternatives. This has raised concerns of a fresh “scramble for Africa”, with multinational companies expending more energy and resources in securing new users than tackling hate speech and misinformation.

Social media, democracy and accountability

From the recent “virtual protest” in Zambia to #ZimbabweanLivesMatter, the potential of social media to empower dissenting voices is clear.

Idayat Hassan and Jamie Hitchen’s analysis of WhatsApp and Facebook use ahead of elections in The Gambia shows that even in rural areas with limited connectivity, social media content contributes to offline political mobilisation.

It is important not to lose sight of this more positive impact amid the growing focus on fake news and hate speech.

Sadly, though, further problems are on the horizon. Azeb Madebo reveals how the Ethiopian diaspora has fuelled the polarisation between the Oromo community on the one hand, and the Ethiopian government and Ethiopian nationalists on the other.

Not all fake news is believed of course, but when stories play into widely held fears, prejudices and assumptions, they can exacerbate distrust and encourage a cycle of violence.

It is, therefore, significant that there is relatively little regulation of content moderation. Julie Owono shows that in part this can be attributed to the limited local capacity of content providers such as Facebook or Twitter. Neither has invested heavily in African experts capable of identifying fake news and hate speech circulated on their platforms.

In part, it is also rooted in the limited funding available for civil society groups, considerable linguistic diversity, and the volume of information being shared. As a result, organisations such as Africa Check highlight instances of fake news but cannot hope to cover all harmful content.

There are no easy answers to these problems though because when governments do try and combat free speech, Ashwanee Budoo finds that misinformation is often abused as an excuse to clamp down on freedom of expression.

Free speech, censorship and Internet shutdowns

While growing internet coverage has enabled citizens to challenge authoritarian rule, non-democratic leaders have also manipulated or disrupted online access. According to Lisa Garbe, internet shutdowns have become the “new normal” in some authoritarian states. This is especially so during politically contested periods such as elections or major protests.

Moreover, while internet shutdowns are important, they are the thin end of the wedge. A number of steps have been taken to prevent citizens from being able to express themselves online. There is a growing use of spyware across the continent to snoop on government critics.

In Tanzania, restrictive laws about what can be said online go hand in hand with government pressure. A prominent lawyer was recently fired because of her “activism”.

Uganda, Benin and several other states have imposed a social media tax that has excluded many users.

Meanwhile, those who can afford internet access still face restrictions on governments information. Thus, Lisa-Marie Selvik argues that digital technology has done little to give many African citizens the right to basic government information.

What we know and what we don’t know

Some sixteen years on since the creation of Twitter, it is becoming clear what we do and don’t know about digital democracy in Africa. We know that digital technology is acting as a disruptive force that simultaneously has “liberating” and destructive potential.

The continent has yet to develop an effective way to stop the flow of fake news. And the full benefits of digital democracy are being thwarted by digital exclusion that is driven by the high cost of data, the strategies of authoritarian governments, and in some cases the approach of major tech companies themselves.
But, what we don’t know is just as important. We urgently need more research in a number of areas.

To what extent has social media exacerbated ethnic-regional tensions? How much online content is actually produced by governments and the trolls that work for them? Who should be responsible for content moderation and how can ethnolinguistic diversity be accounted for? What are the political and socio-economy consequences of restricting internet access, and how can this be resisted? Does the finding that how an individual behaves online does not dramatically change their offline political activity in Uganda hold more broadly? And is social media reinforcing existing gender norms rather than challenging them?

These questions should inspire the research agendas of the future.

Source: The Conversation