Understanding COVID-19 through a Sociological Perspective

Basic Perspective – medical

Bigger side is the social dimension – affected people in the way we live that has a lot of
social consequences

 We look at patterns depending when we are coming from

 Why do people do what they do?
 How people interact?
 We have to make sense of what we do, we cannot live alone because we are
meant to be with others

 COVID-19 in terms of sociological perspective/dimension goes beyond the medical

dimension, depends where we are coming from – normal sense is we have to be with
others such as going to work, market, church
 New normal – things we do normally aren’t done in the usual way; poses particular
problems for everyone
 Until when are we going to isolate people?
 The pandemic has also dawned to cases of mental health.
 Social behaviors are altered by the pandemic.
 When we are locked down we are provided few provisions; our regularity is affected.
 The impact of the crackdown depends on the meaning we attach to it.
 What happens in our life reflects what happens in the society.
 COVID has yielded to different meanings and symbols from the issue of govts
incompetency – kakulangang panlipunan like in the medical field and the govt to
respond to the needs of the people
 How are we going to embrace the new normal and how long can we immediately take
in the new normal?
 Use the communication strategy that is used during election period.
 No clear basis of when they will lift the lockdown
 Uncertainty about the measures which will dictate the future actions dealing with the
crisis.
 Issues of competence and incompetence, social story of solidarity in their own little
way without being told of anybody out of compassion.
 People assume the regularity of their mental health when they are with other people.
How mentally stable are we? How are we adjusting from isolation? Are we really all
okay?
 Karl Marx (made the scientific of capitalism) would tell the struggle of people under
capitalism. It shows how his theory of inequality applies in the society. It reveals the
existence of increasing disparity between social classes.
 Pandemic has also resulted to questions related to selfhood/identity; inequality made
clearer.
 People manifest their capacity to provide their needs.
 Reality is socially constructed depending on the socialization you have, the trainings
you have practice. How do people see COVID? We have to see how they perceive this
pandemic and from that, dun huhugot ang govt ng solutions. Big part of solving this
pandemic is more of social than political matter. We just treated this pandemic as a
medical problem than a social one.
 People’s troubles must be understood as public issue (Wright Mills Theory).
 It requires a lot of common sense which is not common in this new normal thing. While
we call it new normal situations, nobody likes this situation to be normalized (Aguja,
2020).
 The problem is that the medical solution did not fit in our social conditions and this is
where crisis emerges.
 This is a social problem that requires social solutions — it should be just and humane.
 In capitalism it gives you the privilege to live, when you are poor, you are tied from the
machine and when you are rich you are not tied.
 Marx always go on social welfare. We need to work in order for us to enjoy our well-
being.
 Social justice is “neither communism nor despotism nor atomism nor anarchy” but the
humanization of laws and the equalization of social and economic force by the State so
that justice in its rational and objectively secular conception may at least be
approximated. It means the promotion of the welfare of all the people, the adoption by
the government measures calculated to ensure economic stability of all the competent
elements of society, through the maintenance of a proper. (Calalang v. Williams)
 We have to solve this problem not just because for the recession of economy but for the
individuals well-being. We need equilibrium.
 The economic crisis today is different from the past economic recession because the
latter per se was the cause itself.