2020 has been an eventful year, and one with many connections to the past. Whether through anniversaries, or events replicating (or outright repeating) themselves we’re going to have a glance at some of the events which have happened over 2020.
The Worst Year Ever?
For fairly understandable reasons, 2020 has been seen as one of the worst years in history. From the mass wildfires and flooding in Australia; to government crackdowns and instability in Kyrgyzstan, Thailand, and Mali (to name a few); the issue of racialised police brutality in the US; and, of course, the COVID-19 pandemic sweeping the world. There are many contenders for the title of ‘worst year ever’ – the expansion of the Second World War in 1941, or the horrific human rights abuses of 1942 spring to mind. However, one year which certainly seems to also be a contender for worst year ever has to be 536. Something familiar to what we’ve seen in 2020, the year 536 is known for plague and climate crisis. A violent volcanic eruption in either Iceland or El Salvador led to a climate catastrophe thanks to the sheer amount of ash pumped into the atmosphere. Until around 539 the climate remained in a crisis. The Gaelic Irish Annals, such as the Annals of Ulster, reported a ‘shortage of bread’ leading to famine, and Chinese writers reported that there was snow in August! Volcanic ash created colder global temperatures, and issues with rainfall destroying crops. Some areas, like Peru, saw intense droughts for example. The ash also blocked out the sun which many saw as the sign of destruction – Byzantine historian Procopius wrote ‘during this year a most dread portent took place. For the sun gave forth its light without brightness … and it seemed exceedingly like the sun in eclipse, for the beams it shed were not clear‘.
The collapse of crops led to the collapse of states. The Gupta Empire in north India would suffer so badly it would not see another decade; Gothic tribes would invade the Byzantines empire and Italy looking for greener pastures; the Mayan city Teotihuacan began to go into decline; and the Peruvian Moche culture also began to vanish. It has even been theorised that the events of Ragnarok in Norse mythology were based on cultural memory of this period. On top of that the beginning of Justinian’s Plague happened. Properly hitting in 541 the bubonic plague began spreading during this period, and became the first plague pandemic. By 549 around a quarter of the eastern Mediterranean’s population had died, and around 5,000 were dying a day. Plague and climate change – something we can relate to in 2020. If we count the entire planet’s history, then, just maybe, the day the asteroid which wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago was a pretty bad day – 75% of life went extinct.
Coronavirus and Spanish Influenza
The 1920s opened with a pandemic and now so have the 2020s. The COVID-19 Pandemic has dominated the news this year, and obvious links have been made with the Spanish Influenza Pandemic a century ago. Both pandemics highlighted the deep flaws in society, and how the disease impacted groups based on class, race, gender, ability etc. The COVID-19 Pandemic has been met with figures outright denying its existence (such as Rupert Murdoch and Jair Bolsonaro), downplaying its danger (such as Donald Trump and Boris Johnson), or trying to cover up the impact of the virus (such as China’s initial response). This was a repetition of what happened a century ago. To avoid declining moral further during the First World War fighting powers actively supress stories about the outbreak – it became known as ‘Spanish Flu’, much to the chagrin of Spain, as papers could report on the Spanish king contracting the flu. Just like today, effective quarantines prevented the spread where Australia and Samoa (in 1920) and Vietnam and New Zealand (in 2020) managed to avoid the worst of it. Global networks always spread diseases quickly – the Silk Road spread the Bubonic Plague, the war and empire spread Spanish Flu, and globalised networks spread COVID-19. Although there is a notable difference – Spanish Flu was more fatal to young, healthy people while COVID-19 is more fatal to those with weaker immune systems.
Fault lines in society were quickly shown in both pandemics. The Spanish Flu became infamous for scenes of overcrowded, poorly ran hospitals already stretched thin thanks to the aftermath of the First World War. Today, countries with good health care systems (like Cuba and New Zealand) or have the infrastructure to deal with outbreaks (like Guinea and Tanzania) have fared far better than countries lacking that. Cuts to Britain’s NHS has resulted in the UK having one of the highest mortality and infection rates in Europe. Small, tightly packed housing in cities like Oslo made more people contract Spanish Influenza, and Indian women were more likely to contract it compared to men as they were expected to be care givers. Coronavirus has fallen similarly across class, and through that race and gender, lines. While many were put into lock-down, those classified as ‘essential workers’ were still forced into work, such as supermarket workers. In many societies this has led to, an often racialised, workforce at risk of the virus. In the UK, for example, black and Asian communities have been ravaged by coronavirus, just as poorer Italian-American families in New York or Jewish families in London were also ravaged in 1920. The British blockade of Germany meant that Germany and Austria-Hungary were unable to better fight Spanish Influenza, just as the current US blockade on Iran has meant that it has been unable to import medical equipment to fight coronavirus. In 1960 Castroist Cuba started its long history of humanitarian aid by sending workers to help Chile following a devastating earthquake, and during the pandemic several states benefited from this as well. Italy received Cuban doctors when it was devastated by the virus, and Cuba accepted a British cruise liner which had people infected by the virus.
Technology and Communication
This year our usage technology and communication has really become apparent. The constant exploitative nature of capitalism being, somewhat, paused during the lockdowns showed the impact we have had on the environment. Meanwhile, those who could afford it found comfort in connecting with friends and family through Skype, Zoom, Facetime, and other platforms, or found entertainment with Netflix, YouTube, Disney+ or others. Theaters and even zoos moved online. A century ago we saw the rapid rise of radio for the general public. In January Marconi began intermittent broadcasts from Chelmsford, England, and in February it would host two, half-hour long shows daily. In June Australian soprano Dame Nellie Melba became the first popular performer to be broadcast via radio appearing on one of Marconi’s shows. These would end at the end of the year, but in 1922 Marconi would return with daily shows. In Argentina, Sociedad Radio Argentina would broadcast a live performance of Wagner underway in Buenos Aires to all 12 households which had a receiver – how things quickly changed. In regards to film, Zorro made his cinematic debut and one of cinema’s first animated characters, Felix the Cat.
Social media has particularly been used to document human rights abuses and protest movements. We’ll discuss this more in detail later, but the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement following the murder of George Floyd in the US was due to the incident becoming viral. Protest movements have garnered international attention and helped others communicate in order to form coordinated movements. Mali, Kyrgyzstan, Thailand, Hong Kong, Belarus, Chile, Nigeria, and Bolivia are just some examples. Social media allowed anti-coup activists in Bolivia to get their message out allowing the Movement for Socialism to win the election despite the authoritarian right-wing government’s attempt to silence it. Similarly, protestors in Chile managed to have the constitution re-written. The Chilean constitution was written by dictator Augusto Pinochet just before he resigned in 1988 giving senators (like himself) immunity and a seat for life, enshrining neo-liberal capitalism in the country (which cut welfare support for Chile’s poorest communities), and limited the rights of women, such as banning abortion. The re-writing of this constitution is another step towards Chile healing from the horrors of Pinochet’s rule. Just as the protests of this year, protests and movements have always relied on mass media for support. From the usage of the internet during the recent Arab Spring to the horrors of the Vietnam War being transmitted into every American home to commemorative plates and snuff boxes honouring ‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’ following the 1745 Jacobite Uprising.
Racism and Human Rights
Black Lives Matter (BLM) saw a resurgence this year for unfortunate reasons. On May 26 police officers killed an African-American man called George Floyd. The horrific footage, which included one officer kneeling on Floyd’s neck as he gasps ‘I can’t breathe’, sparked a global movement. Although the police brutality and repression was poised as an ‘American only’ issue – it soon took a local form worldwide. Britain saw protests about the killing of people of colour, such as reviving the case of Sheku Bayoh who was killed by Scottish police; Nigerians protested the draconian Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) after they publicly shot a man; and in Israel young Israelis protested the apartheid policies of the state, and its treatment of Palestinians and non-white Jews. The Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s can easily be linked to this. The actions of Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks, the SNCC and others galvanized protestors across the world. Social media allowed the US BLM to become national and international just as television helped the Civil Rights Movement to do so. South Africa, Trinidad, the UK, and France are just some states which saw civil rights campaigns inspired by the US, and the radical branch also were inspired by American Black Power. Groups emulating the Black Panther Party alone include the Israeli Black Panthers, British Black Panthers, Dalit Panthers in India, and Polynesian Panthers in New Zealand.
East Asians have also faced intense racism this year. As COVID-19 originated in China, and the first outbreak occurred in Wuhan, Chinese, and East Asians in general, have faced intense racism. Just this month, an East Asian student has assaulted outside the University of Edinburgh’s library by a group of white thugs. Politicians including Donald Trump have stoked hatred against Asians as a way to avoid blame for mishandling the pandemic – while the UK enters its third lockdown, water parks are now open in Wuhan. A disinterest in non-white states meant that Europe and the Americas looked to each other, basically disasters looking at disasters, instead of South Korea, Vietnam, Singapore, and Guinea which handled it well. Associating racial minorities with disease is not new. Even during the Black Death Jews were massacred as they were blamed with spreading the disease, including ‘poisoning the wells’. During the nineteenth and early-twentieth century anti-immigration laws and rhetoric were created on the concept of keeping the nation ‘healthy’. Outbreaks of cholera and tuberculosis were not blamed on poor housing, but the people themselves. Poor Europeans arriving in New York had to receive a health check on Ellis Island, and papers said that migrants brought disease. Health was also used to mean racial health. Social Darwinistic views and eugenics argued that ‘inferior stock’ would ‘dilute’ the strength of the ‘white race’. Anti-immigration walked hand-in-hand with white supremacy. It is no coincidence, that a wave of anti-immigration laws and the Spanish Influenza outbreak also saw the rise of the Second Ku Klux Klan who expanded their targets to include Jews, Catholics, and socialists (in the US often associated with Germans and Italians).
The Crisis in Ethiopia
Since the beginning of November a crisis has been occurring in Ethiopia which has seen intense human rights abuses against the Tigray and Amhara people. Ethiopia’s constitution guarantees the right to self-determination for all its ethnic groups, but the government has recently violated this part of the constitution. The Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) in 2019 refused to join the ruling coalition, and conflict emerged earlier this year. Elections were postponed nationwide thanks to COVID-19, but the Tigray regional government held one anyway seeing the delay in elections as being an overstretch by the central government. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who won the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize, belongs to the largest ethnic group in Ethiopia, the Oromo. Human rights abuses, including massacres, have occurred since November, mostly against the Tigray people. Amhara communities have also been impacted – on 10 November the mostly Amharic village of Mai Kadra saw over 500 people murdered. It is unknown who did the massacre, although Amnesty International believes that both the state and Tigray forces did it. Over 25,000 have been made into internal refugees, and their position is precarious as the virus spread quickly in refugee camps. Tigrayans have been fired from government roles, the internet was cut off in Tigray, and Tigrayan bank accounts were frozen. Ethnic conflict has not been noticeable in Ethiopia’s history, but these modern conflicts emerged in the Ethiopian Civil War (1974-1991). A military coup overthrew the emperor in 1974, and various rebel groups emerged with a wide range of political identities, ranging from Marxist-Leninists to monarchists. As they originated in local regions, and several aimed to seek independence, the Civil War saw ethnic conflict. A loose coalition, which the TPLF belonged to, took power in 1991, but the legacies of a two decade long civil war which saw ethnic conflict cannot go away so quickly. Unfortunately, things do not seem to be resolving peacefully, and other factors will kill many people. A locust swarm threatens to destroy Ethiopia’s crops, and there’s coronavirus – most of those who died in the Civil War died thanks to the 1984-5 famine.
Iranian Assassination
On January 3 leading Iranian general Qasem Soleimani was killed by a US airstrike approved by Donald Trump. Soleimani was a beloved figure in Iran for his decisive actions against ISIS, although he is also infamous for his destructive actions against Kurdish movements. This was an unprecedented assassination – Soleimani was one of the most important figures in Iran, and the assassination had been in peacetime. In retaliation, Iran fired on US bases in Iraq and accidentally shot down one of its airliners mistaking it as an enemy plane. The assassination was done to curb Iranian power in the region, and possibly even get the US public behind Trump just before an election. Many people pointed to another famous assassination which led to a war. On 28 June 1914 heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated by 19-year old Serb nationalist Gavrilo Princip. What followed was a series of private diplomatic instances which culminated in Austria invading Serbia at the end of July, which, in turn, caused a domino effect leading to the First World War. However, this is also a trend in Iranian history. Since the mid-1800s western powers have intervened in Iran; BP for example was formed as a way for Britain to monopolise the Iranian economy. In 1953 the CIA and MI6 conspired with the shah and military to oust moderate socialist prime minister Mohammad Mosaddegh after he tried to nationalise British oil companies. The shah would lead a corrupt and authoritarian state which opened its economy for western intervention until it itself was ousted in 1979 by the Iranian Revolution.
Environmental Crisis
We have seen intense environmental crises throughout this year. In January we welcomed 2020 with a wave of bushfires in Australia which swept over 18 million hectares driving thousands from their home, and leading to 500 million vertebrate animals to be killed. The deaths of 8,000 already endangered koalas has meant that they face an incredibly real possibility of extinction soon, and some animals most likely will go extinct very soon, if not already. Two species of Kangaroo Island spiders have not been sighted since the fires, and the Kate’s leaf gecko has lost its habitat. Ligurian honey bees have also lost half their beehives. Climate catastrophe has hit not just Australia. Thousands were displaced or killed in India and Nepal when the Brahmaputra River flooded; Hurricane Laura, possibly the strongest hurricane on record, hit Louisiana in August; and Typhoon Goni, possibly the strongest tropical cyclone in history, hit the Philippines in October. Humans have always been impacted by changes in climate. The Little Ice Age, from around 1200 to 1700, caused weather effects which destroyed crops and even states. The 1600s saw some of the worst conflicts in history at the same time as snowstorms in the summer, intense droughts, and a spike in witch burnings in Europe.
The current mass extinction event is the second one to have humans play an impact in. The Quaternary extinction event, from around 600,000 to 13,000 years ago, saw the disappearance of so many major animals – mammoths, woolly rhinos, sabre-toothed cats, cave lions, giant sloths, and virtually all of Australia’s megafauna. Climate change was the main reason for this, but humans were the ones to finish them off. Humans can basically claim the dubious honour in wiping out the animals and plants during the current, Holocene, mass extinction. Human-caused climate change has placed intense pressure on environments, and capitalistic exploitation of the environment threatens to wipe them out. Global temperatures changing are destroying the Indonesian rainforests threatening orang-utans, but it is the destruction of their home to make room for palm oil to feed the Global North is what will drive them to extinction. Unless things change quickly, we will lose many species, and for many it is too late.
The Largest Strike in History
As expected, this post has been depressing. So on a lighter note the largest strike in history took place this November. In response to the government implementing several policies which would reverse farmer and labour protection policies, 250,000 farmers and workers took to the streets of Delhi. They were joined by students, other workers, women’s groups, and other protest groups came out in solidarity across India totaling a staggering 250 million people! Indian protests have always brought out large numbers, as seen in the struggle for independence, but this could mean that it was the largest strike in history. It is still ongoing as we speak. Will 2021 be the undoing of Narendra Modi and his despotic rule?
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