A stick known as coronavirus has suddenly been shoved through the spokes of the world’s whirling wheel of hyperactivity and brought public life to a halt. Traffic, commerce, sports, schools, universities, day cares, public events, and even worship are now prohibited by the state. The Open Society is on lockdown, and one country after another is putting its population under house arrest.
The government’s remarkable interventions in citizens’ lives are accepted without resistance. What’s more, the more severe the measures, the more responsible these governments’ behaviors appear to be. In Shanghai, public life works only with a barcode that each citizen must wear on his wrist. He can be scanned at any time and receives instructions on how and where he can go, whether to work or to quarantine. In Germany, the telecom system is providing the Robert Koch Institute with data on cellphone users’ movements.
