The Shifting Epistemological Horizon of the Pandemic

Abstract

The reaction to the pandemic has put in place some profound transformations. These transformations do not come entirely anew. They are rooted in the long-term process of oscillation between scientism and relativism. Yet, the fallout of the pandemic promises to work as a new global social regulatory system, different from the ones that predate it. Thereby, it preludes to a paradigmatic epistemological shift. I sketch out four dimensions of such a shift, which I refer to in terms of vectors, in order to emphasise the directional as well as orientational nature of such elements. A vector is a pattern of long-term and large-scale social change. It manifests as a historical configuration of power that organises the collective and individual activities of humans. The evolution of these four vectors designs trajectories of development. The four vectors of the shifting horizon of the pandemic are as follows: the normalisation of the colonial exception; the centrality of necro-politics as global technology of control; the displacement of uncertainty from the margin to the centre of the intersectional space between expert knowledge, political power and public opinion; the radicalisation of the word ‘theory’.