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Spring 2021: A Collection of 55 Articles Shows how Predatory Leaders Brought Crises to the Global Community
A network of interconnected crises that includes COVID-19, racism, the climate crisis, and global economic upheaval has left the global community beleaguered, exhausted, and divided. This network seems to have agency, a life of its own, travelling to where leadership is weakest and inequalities starkest. Even as rich countries emerge from the pandemic, many citizens have a sense of guilt and anger knowing that a large percentage of COVID deaths was avoidable and, locally and globally, vulnerable populations were and continue to be, hit hardest.
Based on decades of field research in remote villages and capital cities of Latin America, Africa and Asia, Dr. Chris Simms unearths evidence of the powerful preying on the powerless while tapping their resources and ignoring their needs. He describes today's struggle in North America and Europe, between science and ideology, and between public health and economic values.
Predatory leadership enables these crises. It is, leadership borne of self-interest that seeks to exploit, oppress, victimize, and to take, what belongs to others. Historically, this form of leadership was, embodied by European colonialism and the slave trade, and it is, seen today in the deregulation of markets, the capture of national tax codes by elites and the role of "dark money". Political leaders preyed upon the biases and vulnerabilities of disenfranchised populations and encouraged ethnic and racial tension for their own political advantage. Predatory leadership likewise undergirds the actions of Russia in Eastern Europe and of China in Hong Kong and Africa. It is pervasive within multilateral agencies such as the World Bank, whose prioritization of its neoliberal agenda over public health during the HIV/AIDS pandemic created a template for inequitable responses to COVID-19 and vaccine nationalism.
Based on decades of field research in remote villages and capital cities of Latin America, Africa and Asia, the author describes the struggle between science and ideology, public health and economic values, and between greed and selflessness. He warns that privileging the present over the future is leading to the ultimate tragedy, the irrevocable loss of planetary health. With governments' ongoing failure to prepare and plan ahead, to monitor, mitigate and adjust, the author concludes we may be getting the leadership we deserve. Nevertheless, the United States appears to be returning to its core values and role as world leader. It will most certainly, be tested, as more and worse crises lay ahead.
This reader consists of 55 articles drawn from publications that the author produced over the last 20 years. About half of these articles have appeared in the Lancet or the BMJ in various forms but mainly as opinion pieces. Others are, drawn from publications supported by NGOs such as Christian Aid, Action Aid, and Save the Children while others have been, published in the Guardian newspaper, Institute of Development Studies (UK), and journals such as the International Journal of Clinical Practice, the CMAJ, Canadian Journal of Public Health, New England Journal of Medicine, and the American Psychologist.
A network of interconnected crises that includes COVID-19, racism, the climate crisis, and global economic upheaval has left the global community beleaguered, exhausted, and divided. This network seems to have agency, a life of its own, travelling to where leadership is weakest and inequalities starkest. Even as rich countries emerge from the pandemic, many citizens have a sense of guilt and anger knowing that a large percentage of COVID deaths was avoidable and, locally and globally, vulnerable populations were and continue to be, hit hardest.
Based on decades of field research in remote villages and capital cities of Latin America, Africa and Asia, Dr. Chris Simms unearths evidence of the powerful preying on the powerless while tapping their resources and ignoring their needs. He describes today's struggle in North America and Europe, between science and ideology, and between public health and economic values.
Predatory leadership enables these crises. It is, leadership borne of self-interest that seeks to exploit, oppress, victimize, and to take, what belongs to others. Historically, this form of leadership was, embodied by European colonialism and the slave trade, and it is, seen today in the deregulation of markets, the capture of national tax codes by elites and the role of "dark money". Political leaders preyed upon the biases and vulnerabilities of disenfranchised populations and encouraged ethnic and racial tension for their own political advantage. Predatory leadership likewise undergirds the actions of Russia in Eastern Europe and of China in Hong Kong and Africa. It is pervasive within multilateral agencies such as the World Bank, whose prioritization of its neoliberal agenda over public health during the HIV/AIDS pandemic created a template for inequitable responses to COVID-19 and vaccine nationalism.
Based on decades of field research in remote villages and capital cities of Latin America, Africa and Asia, the author describes the struggle between science and ideology, public health and economic values, and between greed and selflessness. He warns that privileging the present over the future is leading to the ultimate tragedy, the irrevocable loss of planetary health. With governments' ongoing failure to prepare and plan ahead, to monitor, mitigate and adjust, the author concludes we may be getting the leadership we deserve. Nevertheless, the United States appears to be returning to its core values and role as world leader. It will most certainly, be tested, as more and worse crises lay ahead.
This reader consists of 55 articles drawn from publications that the author produced over the last 20 years. About half of these articles have appeared in the Lancet or the BMJ in various forms but mainly as opinion pieces. Others are, drawn from publications supported by NGOs such as Christian Aid, Action Aid, and Save the Children while others have been, published in the Guardian newspaper, Institute of Development Studies (UK), and journals such as the International Journal of Clinical Practice, the CMAJ, Canadian Journal of Public Health, New England Journal of Medicine, and the American Psychologist.