{"title":"危机叙事与非洲悖论:非洲非正规经济、COVID-19和社会政策的非殖民化","authors":"Kate Meagher","doi":"10.1111/dech.12737","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article challenges the role of COVID-19 crisis narratives in shaping social policy choices in Africa. The COVID-19 pandemic has focused attention on Africa's vast informal economies, both as a symbol of the continent's intense vulnerability to the ravages of the pandemic, and as a puzzle in the face of the uneven and limited effects of COVID-19 across the continent. Indeed, an examination of statistical and documentary evidence reveals an inverse relationship between COVID-19 fatalities and the size of African informal economies, and a perverse relationship between best-practice COVID social protection responses and levels of COVID-19 mortality. Scrutinizing the evidence behind African COVID-19 crisis narratives raises questions about the ability of donor-led digitized social protection paradigms to address social needs in highly informalized, low-resource environments. This article highlights the role of crisis narratives as an exercise of power geared to remastering, homogenizing and reimagining African informal economies in ways that facilitate particular types of development intervention, sidelining alternative, more socially grounded policy perspectives. Through a closer examination of historical and contemporary realities in Africa's vast and varied informal economies, the article highlights the need to decolonize social policy by privileging local needs and policy perspectives over global policy agendas in the interest of transformative rather than palliative policy responses.</p>","PeriodicalId":48194,"journal":{"name":"Development and Change","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0000,"publicationDate":"2022-12-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ftp.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pub/pmc/oa_pdf/ea/8e/DECH-53-1200.PMC9877792.pdf","citationCount":"1","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"Crisis Narratives and the African Paradox: African Informal Economies, COVID-19 and the Decolonization of Social Policy\",\"authors\":\"Kate Meagher\",\"doi\":\"10.1111/dech.12737\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"<p>This article challenges the role of COVID-19 crisis narratives in shaping social policy choices in Africa. The COVID-19 pandemic has focused attention on Africa's vast informal economies, both as a symbol of the continent's intense vulnerability to the ravages of the pandemic, and as a puzzle in the face of the uneven and limited effects of COVID-19 across the continent. Indeed, an examination of statistical and documentary evidence reveals an inverse relationship between COVID-19 fatalities and the size of African informal economies, and a perverse relationship between best-practice COVID social protection responses and levels of COVID-19 mortality. Scrutinizing the evidence behind African COVID-19 crisis narratives raises questions about the ability of donor-led digitized social protection paradigms to address social needs in highly informalized, low-resource environments. This article highlights the role of crisis narratives as an exercise of power geared to remastering, homogenizing and reimagining African informal economies in ways that facilitate particular types of development intervention, sidelining alternative, more socially grounded policy perspectives. Through a closer examination of historical and contemporary realities in Africa's vast and varied informal economies, the article highlights the need to decolonize social policy by privileging local needs and policy perspectives over global policy agendas in the interest of transformative rather than palliative policy responses.</p>\",\"PeriodicalId\":48194,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"Development and Change\",\"volume\":null,\"pages\":null},\"PeriodicalIF\":3.0000,\"publicationDate\":\"2022-12-11\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"https://ftp.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pub/pmc/oa_pdf/ea/8e/DECH-53-1200.PMC9877792.pdf\",\"citationCount\":\"1\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"Development and Change\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"90\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/dech.12737\",\"RegionNum\":2,\"RegionCategory\":\"社会学\",\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"Q1\",\"JCRName\":\"DEVELOPMENT STUDIES\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Development and Change","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/dech.12737","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"DEVELOPMENT STUDIES","Score":null,"Total":0}
Crisis Narratives and the African Paradox: African Informal Economies, COVID-19 and the Decolonization of Social Policy
This article challenges the role of COVID-19 crisis narratives in shaping social policy choices in Africa. The COVID-19 pandemic has focused attention on Africa's vast informal economies, both as a symbol of the continent's intense vulnerability to the ravages of the pandemic, and as a puzzle in the face of the uneven and limited effects of COVID-19 across the continent. Indeed, an examination of statistical and documentary evidence reveals an inverse relationship between COVID-19 fatalities and the size of African informal economies, and a perverse relationship between best-practice COVID social protection responses and levels of COVID-19 mortality. Scrutinizing the evidence behind African COVID-19 crisis narratives raises questions about the ability of donor-led digitized social protection paradigms to address social needs in highly informalized, low-resource environments. This article highlights the role of crisis narratives as an exercise of power geared to remastering, homogenizing and reimagining African informal economies in ways that facilitate particular types of development intervention, sidelining alternative, more socially grounded policy perspectives. Through a closer examination of historical and contemporary realities in Africa's vast and varied informal economies, the article highlights the need to decolonize social policy by privileging local needs and policy perspectives over global policy agendas in the interest of transformative rather than palliative policy responses.
期刊介绍:
Development and Change is essential reading for anyone interested in development studies and social change. It publishes articles from a wide range of authors, both well-established specialists and young scholars, and is an important resource for: - social science faculties and research institutions - international development agencies and NGOs - graduate teachers and researchers - all those with a serious interest in the dynamics of development, from reflective activists to analytical practitioners