Capitalising on COVID-19?

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted two of the major initiatives of the OECD and the World Bank—the organisation of production on a genuinely global scale through global value chains, and the creation of a skilled and mobile proletariat through employment-related education and the promotion of mobility within and across borders. At the same time, it has brought significant advances in the development and exploitation of digital platforms, along with flexible working and working from home. The two organisations have produced hundreds of policy documents and extended analyses that encourage flexible working, but express increasing concern over the setback that the pandemic represents to reforms initiated over the last decade in particular. The overall conclusion is that on balance the pandemic represents less an opportunity to profit from crisis than a threat to the promotion of versatility, flexibility, and mobility on the part of workers around the world.