In the first blog post, after looking at other major socio-economic shocks of the past, John discusses three other articles,all of which examined how COVID-19 might change our societies over the long term.  First was a Politico article entitled Coronavirus Will Change the World Permanently. Here’s How.  This article included short essays from 34 "big thinkers," including our colleague Peter Coleman.  Peter's essay parallels our notion of opportunity of the "never again moment," as well as looking at this moment as something of a crossroads, although he uses the terms "changing course," and shocks "breaking different ways, making things better or worse." But, he says, "now is the time to begin to promote more constructive patterns in our cultural and political discourse.  The time for change is clearly ripening." 

"The extraordinary shock(s) to our system that the coronavirus pandemic is bringing has the potential to break America out of the 50-plus year pattern of escalating political and cultural polarization we have been trapped in, and help us to change course toward greater national solidarity and functionality.  It might sound idealistic, but there are two reasons to think it can happen.

The extraordinary shock(s) to our system that the coronavirus pandemic is bringing has the potential to break America out of the 50-plus year pattern of escalating political and cultural polarization we have been trapped in, and help us to change course toward greater national solidarity and functionality. (Peter Coleman)

 

The first is the “common enemy” scenario, in which people begin to look past their differences when faced with a shared external threat.  COVID-19 is presenting us with a formidable enemy that will not distinguish between reds and blues, and might provide us with fusion-like energy and a singularity of purpose to help us reset and regroup.  During the Blitz, the 56-day Nazi bombing campaign against the Britain, Winston Churchill’s cabinet was amazed and heartened to witness the ascendance of human goodness – altruism, compassion and generosity of spirit and action.

 

The second reason is the “political shock wave” scenario.  Studies have shown that strong, enduring relational patterns often become more susceptible to change after some type of major shock destabilizes them.  This doesn’t necessarily happen right away, but a study of 850 enduring inter-state conflicts that occurred between 1816 to 1992 found that more than 75 percent of them ended within 10 years of a major destabilizing shock.  Societal shocks can break different ways, making things better or worse.  But given our current levels of tension, this scenario suggests that now is the time to begin to promote more constructive patterns in our cultural and political discourse.  The time for change is clearly ripening.

The second article John highlights is in the New York TImes, entitled Is the Coronavirus Shaping the Future of How We Work?  This article, too, suggests that we may be at "an inflection point of the same significance as World War II."  As John explains, "this article highlights a potential "pendulum" shift in attitudes about individual versus community responsibility and the importance of strong government policy." 

The last article is a New York TImes op ed entitled What Is a College Education in the Time of Coronavirus?, Here again, John sees a "crossroads." "During the NNN, various educational programs may mostly go back to what they previously were doing with some additional online education, or they may make more fundamental changes in their educational theories and techniques."

John concludes:

Decisions in the CNN period are likely to have long-term effects during the NNN period.  Some “interim” changes will become institutionalized for the indefinite future and others will not.  There may or may not be decreased polarization, increased communitarian social policy, and increased online education.  

 

What will happen is not inevitable.  It is contingent on people’s attitudes and actions, individually and collectively

It’s easy to imagine that there would be increased consensus or continued bitter political polarization.  The US government may provide for broad New Deal / Great Society social protections or a more limited “safety net.”  Colleges and universities may make fundamental changes in the structures of their programs or they may maintain traditional models.

 

This describes polar opposites as if on a single dimension, but the reality is likely to be somewhere in the middle and more complex with substantial variation.

 

 What will happen is not inevitable.  It is contingent on people’s attitudes and actions, individually and collectively

John's  second blog post focuses on the NNN in legal and dispute resolution practice, the courts and legal education examining how much of this can successfully be done with video, and he wonders how much a reliance on video and other technological innovations will persist after the crisis is over.  He also observes that the Federal Bureau of Prisons is releasing criminals who are not considered a threat to society and wonders will the crisis lead to policies which dramatically decrease the U.S. incarceration rate in the future?  John then considers how the crisis might change Legal and Dispute Resolution Education and introduces a book and a project that might be of interest to our readers.  One is called the Theory-of-Change book which presents useful ideas about possible new approaches to teaching.  The second is John's "Stone Soup Project" which is designed to teach and to learn what is actually happening in the world of dispute resolution, and as John points out, this will be a great opportunity to learn what is happening in the dispute resolution world in the wake of COVID.

The third blog post is entitled Communication, Privacy, and Community in the New Normal.  Here, again, John quotes several other articles at length, one being The World After 

Coronavirus, written by an Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari.  Harari advises: "When choosing between alternatives, we should ask ourselves not only how to overcome the immediate threat, but also what kind of world we will inhabit once the storm passes.  Yes, the storm will pass, humankind will survive, most of us will still be alive – but we will inhabit a different world.” Areas that are likely to be different, John suggests, are communication, privacy, and community, each of which he discusses in turn. 

On communication, he turns to Esther Pfaff's post in the Kluwer Mediation Blog,  Communication After COVID-19, in which she argues that the pandemic “will have long-term effects on our communication culture and the culture of conflict.”  While conflict communication is typically poor, she has noticed improved conflict communication since COVID has hit. 

Lately, I have participated in a number of telephone conferences and video chats with a very different vibe.  These calls were thoroughly organized, in full awareness of the challenge that bonding and working in a team via a screen represents.  The calls started with an introduction round, making sure everybody is fine and giving everybody a good understanding of who is actually on the call (in part because everybody is kind of excited about the new working situation, but still).  There was a clear agenda circulated before and rules of communication agreed on.  Many of these calls happened in a pleasant and productive atmosphere, we actually got a lot done.  Because it clearly was the only option.  . . .

Over time, my expectation would be that a much more sophisticated ethical and social code will develop around long-distance communication.  And the more it becomes established, the less likely long-distance communication will be the root cause for so many commercial conflicts.  On this long and bumpy road, I believe mediators have a worthwhile contribution to make.

Going back to Israeli professor Harai, though, John suggests that privacy issues are going to be worsened by the crisis.  Here he discusses the massive personal surveillance that has been started in China and elsewhere to track people with the virus and their contacts which might be continued after the crisis subsides.  In addition, as a lawyer and mediator, he is concerned with the lack of confidentiality of online communications that not only can be hacked, but can also be recorded and then distributed without the knowledge of participants. 

Returning once again to the "crossroads theme" regarding cooperation, John again quotes Harari:   

 “Humanity needs to make a choice.  Will we travel down the route of disunity, or will we adopt the path of global solidarity?  If we choose disunity, this will not only prolong the crisis, but will probably result in even worse catastrophes in the future.  If we choose global solidarity, it will be a victory not only against the coronavirus, but against all future epidemics and crises that might assail humankind in the 21st century.”​

John's adds his own "American" view of this crossroads.

Unfortunately, the outlook for global cooperation isn’t encouraging at the moment, at least as far as the US is concerned.  The current American administration is focused primarily on blaming everyone else rather than cooperating with states and other countries to solve problems.  Indeed, President Trump is actively instigating conflict rather than promoting cooperation.

 

On the other hand, the lack of American leadership has prompted  states and other countries to develop new alliances and “work around” the American federal government.

 

The political conflict related to the crisis takes place in the context of the American political campaign in which voters will have starkly different choices in November.  The election results surely will affect the level of conflict and cooperation in the future, though not necessarily in predictable ways.