Corona pandemic and the changing global economy

The largest unprecedented and devastating health shock of the twenty-first century appeared with the outbreak of Covid-19 virus. It has brought the world to a standstill and thrown before it the challenge of ‘life or livelihood’. Along with massive economic disruption, it has brought considerable human suffering, and significantly affected socio-cultural relationships, behavioural patterns and psychological attitudes governing human interactions. This introductory chapter seeks to provide an overview of the impact of this pandemic on various aspects of the economy and human life output, employment, trade patterns, educational platforms, changes in social relations, gender discrimination and behavioural patterns. It also attempts to explore the extent of preparedness of South Asian countries, and in particular India, to implement revival policies to overcome the crisis. The chapter also tries to analyse and provide a broad overview of revival policy options for combating possible global recession. Finally, the various issues explored in different chapters of this volume in connection with the corona pandemic are also briefly presented herein. © 2022 selection and editorial matter, Rajib Bhattacharyya, Ananya Ghosh Dastidar and Soumyen Sikdar;individual chapters, the contributors.