Crisis and pandemics in the Middle Ages and today, some food for thought
Institutional Communication Service
4 May 2020
Pandemics are a recurring problem in the history of mankind: is there any lesson we can learn from the past? Andrea Gamberini, lecturer at USI and professor of medieval history, tries to answer this question.
In his speech he takes his inspiration from the pestilence of 1347-1348 to show how that dramatic event actually led to a transformation of economic and social dynamics in the sign of development and not of crisis. The post-pandemic period represented, in fact, an extraordinary field of possibilities, in which change and innovation prevailed over stagnation and productive involution. Hence, then, the invitation to reflect on what that event can teach, starting from the enhancement of those deep structures of society, resilient to the crisis, which if supported and not opposed, can define the framework for the recovery.