Kairos
Kairos is typically thought of as “timing” or “the right time”.
Kairos takes on the sense of “due measure”, “proper proportion” or “right timing” so it began to be distinguished from chronos (linear time, the uniform time of the cosmic system, a measure and quantity of duration)
Kairos is that point of time between a fictional beginning and an end, “a point in time filled with significance, charged with a meaning derived from its relation to the end”
Let’s say that worldwide Quarantine for COVID-19, this lockdown is one example of kairos.
In ancient Greek archery, kairos means a long tunnel-like aperture through which the archer’s arrow has to pass. Successful passage of a kairos requires, therefore, that the archer’s arrow be fired not only accurately but with enough power for it to penetrate. It’s the crucial moment to perform accurately and skillfully in order to achieve a goal.
Politic and social impact
Leaders and presidents manage the situation triggered by COVID-19 according to:
Kairos: It’s important to get the attention of the audience, but to occasionally choose a moment to reawaken them to the attention of the speaker.
Chronos: acting speedily, taking advantage of the golden moment by showing amazing boldness and speed.
Let’s say the choice is taken by the weakness of the leaders and the strengths of the audience.
Every country, state and region is doing what they’re doing according to their skills not to a global common sense or world wide solution. Every single community is convinced that they are not been affected by the virus because specific reasons and for sure every government implements different social rules and preventive and obligatory actions.
The really prepared societies fighting against the COVID-19 are often called dictatorships, terrorists…where “the communism failed”: Kurdistan, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, China, Palestine. Let’s say that people is the experiment: how to grow in a different way, where a well balanced kairos/chronos survives where the internationalism is key.
Probably their advantage was to understand how the world runs without implementing it on their own states because the blockade, sanctions and all type of wars blocked the implementation or a combination of this and the self-defense criteria of their culture itself avoid this implementation. The apparently weakness and disadvantage are now the perfect arch to pass the aperture through which the archer’s arrow has to pass.
Pandemic is a witness of our system
We’ve seen that governments can act, and people can change their behaviour, in a very short amount of time. It’s very literally reflecting a slowdown of our live. The coronavirus pandemic can empower us to demand change not just confinement and censorship. The mobilisation to fight the virus shows that we can drastically transform our system and societies to fight a threat.
The pandemic is turning the natural world upside down. We’re experiencing an unprecedented pause in ocean noise and in general that probably hasn’t been experienced in decades. If we are still alive let’s take it as a opportunity, we together can show to the virus a positive change for our future.
We’ve seen that governments can act, and people can change their behaviour, in a very short amount of time. It’s very literally reflecting a slowdown of our live. The coronavirus pandemic can empower us to demand change not just confinement and censorship
References
Rhetoric and Kairos: Essays in History, Theory, and Praxis. Phillip Sipiora, James S. Baumlin
White, Eric Charles. Kaironomia: On the Will-to-Invent. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1987
Vijay Prashad on Implications of Blockade, Sanctions and Threats to Cuba, Venezuela and Iran. video
The coronavirus pandemic can empower us to demand change by Lorenzo Marsili article
Dr. Samah Jabr : “Palestinians survived bombings and the siege. They will survive the coronavirus.”