Conversation

People like to compare China and the west in very abstract, ideological terms, but really I think it boils down to the political feasibility of a *single* tactic: group quarantine. Everything else is pretty much legitimately available within all political systems.
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It would be interesting to apply Dictator’s Handbook lens to this and determine actual extent of power. For example India is nominally a liberal democracy, but Modi probably has tactics available to him that democratically elected leaders generally don’t.
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One of the difficult questions is: assuming there really is a “cost of democracy” holding tech-level constant, should you be personally willing to pay it? Can’t honestly answer that without normalizing for your relative safety as a function of class/wealth.
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I’m totally willing to accept a 10x-100x higher fatality rate (on a low base like 0.1- 1%) for higher civil liberties but then I’m not most at risk from poverty, crowding etc. Healthcare workers at least knowingly sign up for a risky profession.
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Replying to
Yeah, I realize that. My tradeoff is based on severity of civil liberties restrictions under question. 16.5m dead vs North Korea style government? It’s a toss-up. You give up civil liberties you open the doors to things worse than viruses.