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Living Through a Pandemic: Competing Covid-19 Narratives in Rural Zimbabwe

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posted on 2024-09-05, 20:38 authored by Iyleen Judy Bwerinofa, Jacob Mahenehene, Makiwa Manaka, Bulisiwe Mulotshwa, Felix Murimbarimba, Moses Mutoko, Vincent Sarayi, Ian Scoones
Through a real time analysis of the Covid-19 pandemic across rural Zimbabwe, this Working Paper explores the competing narratives that framed responses and their politics. Based on 20 moments of reflection over two years, together with ongoing document and media analysis and an intensive period of qualitative interviewing, a complex, dynamic story of the pandemic ‘drama’ emerges, which contrasts with snapshot perspectives. Across the period, a science-led public health narrative intersects with a security and control narrative promoted by the state and is countered by a citizens’ narrative that emphasises autonomy, independence, and local innovation. The politics of this contestation over narratives about appropriate pandemic responses are examined over three periods – reflecting different waves of infection – and in relation to two conjunctures – an early, strict lockdown and the rollout of vaccines. Different narratives gain ascendancy and overlap at different times, but a local citizen-led narrative emerges strongly in the context of heavy-handed lockdowns, inadequate state capacity, and struggles around rural livelihoods. The pandemic has reshaped relationships between the state and citizens in important ways, with self-reliance rooted in local resilience central to local pandemic responses.

Funding

Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office

History

Publisher

Institute of Development Studies

Citation

Bwerinofa, I.J.; Mahenehene, J.; Manaka, M.; Mulotshwa, B.; Murimbarimba, F.; Mutoko, M.; Sarayi, V. and Scoones, I. (2022) Living Through a Pandemic: Competing Covid-19 Narratives in Rural Zimbabwe, IDS Working Paper 575, Brighton: Institute of Development Studies, DOI: 10.19088/IDS.2022.058

Series

IDS Working Paper 575

Version

  • VoR (Version of Record)

IDS Item Types

IDS Working Paper

Copyright holder

Institute of Development Studies

Country

Zimbabwe

Language

en

IDS team

Rural Futures

Project identifier

Default project::9ce4e4dc-26e9-4d78-96e9-15e4dcac0642::600

Identifier ISBN

978-1-80470-020-4

Identifier ISSN

2040-0209

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