'It was Quiet': Pandemics as Normal Life in a Romanian Town
This essay delves into the ways in which people in Craiova lived through the Romanian national lockdown and its aftermath, and offers a glimpse into the (working-)lives in which crisis is always the 'normal.' The chapter treats the global pandemic as a non-event, to question the "normal lives" we are supposed to go back to: a normal that glorifies narratives of honest labor, while making stable and reliable work a thing of the past; a normal that does not allow the transformation of large categories into surplus populations to be recognized for what it is – a structural feature of late capitalism – but translates it into a repertoire of personal moral obligations and failures. ; This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 792833. The article reflects only the author's view; the Agency is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains.