Commoning Against the Corona Crisis

The Covid-19 crisis has highlighted the ‘precarity’ of human life in general, and particularly that of certain groups in society. It has debunked the myth of the autonomous, self-sufficient individual, and shows the extent to which we always already live ‘in common’, thereby also emphasizing the necessity of commons (of care, nurture, and economic resources). This research explores what role commons, as an antidote to precarity and a form of resistance against governmental precarization, can play in the current situation.

We start by analyzing the relationship between precarity and commons in light of the Covid-19 crisis. On the basis of participant observation in Naples (Italy) we will describe the commoning activities during the pandemic, their governmental invisibilization, and the way in which they could be institutionally recognized as a vital action of care and solidarity, also beyond the emergency. Finally, in the last part, we draw on the work of Roberto Esposito, and his use of the terms community and immunity, arguing that precisely because of the impossibility of fully immunizing ourselves from the virus (and from each other) we have to consider ourselves as part of a community, bound not by shared properties but by a shared obligation.