Podcast Summary

Episode Overview

Podcast: New Books Network
Host: Stentor Danielson
Episode Title: Masaya Llavaneras Blanco and Damien P. Gock eds., "Pandemic Policies and Resistance: Southern Feminist Critiques in Times of Covid-19" (Bloomsbury, 2025)
Date: September 20, 2025

This episode features a conversation with Masaya Llavaneras Blanco and Damien P. Gock, editors of the open-access volume "Pandemic Policies and Resistance: Southern Feminist Critiques in Times of COVID-19." The discussion centers on how feminist activists and scholars in the Global South responded to, analyzed, and shaped pandemic policy, and how transnational collaboration and a Southern feminist lens provide crucial, underrepresented insights for understanding the pandemic and its aftermath.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Backgrounds and Genesis of the Book (01:32–05:27)

• Introduction to the DAWN Collective:
  • DAWN (Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era) is "one of the oldest Southern feminist collectives of its kind," working on economic, gender justice, and sustainable development since 1982. The collective is composed mostly of activists and researchers from the Global South.
  • Masaya serves on DAWN’s executive committee and is an assistant professor at Huron University College (Canada), focusing on global governance and development from a feminist perspective.
  • Damien is a PhD candidate at Western Sydney University specializing in labor mobility and care. He previously worked in DAWN’s secretariat.
• How the Book Emerged:
  • The book began as a collective research project initiated during the acute crisis of COVID-19. The urgency was to understand and document how the pandemic and government policies were impacting marginalized people, especially women, across the Global South.
  • The process prioritized collective action, collaboration, and rapid response to the unfolding crisis.

  "We did what came natural to us, which was investigate what was happening… This huge disruption… we got into this book first, before it was a book, it was a research project out of urgency to understand the moment and to tackle it." — Masaya Llavaneras Blanco (05:27)

2. Book Structure & Collaborative Methodology (07:00–13:50)

• Case Selection and Chapter Organization:
  • The book comprises 12 country-level case studies, each focusing on distinct policy areas relevant to COVID-19.
  • Authors were recruited not just through academia but via feminist and labor movements, regional networks, and cross-movement collaborations—often driven by pre-existing activist links.
  • DAWN developed a scenarios framework, outlining four types of policy/political responses seen globally during COVID-19:
    1. Continuation of existing policy trajectories
    2. Expansion of corporate influence over policy and biopolitics
    3. Intensification of state control and authoritarianism
    4. Transformative, redistributive feminist policies
  • These scenarios, while not mutually exclusive, provided an analytical lens to understand complex, overlapping challenges in the pandemic.

  "It took a lot of work to… build and weave those relationships in ways that were flexible and strong enough to sustain the process in a context of crisis." — Masaya Llavaneras Blanco (11:07)

3. Why a Southern Feminist Lens? (13:50–17:58)

• DAWN's approach is rooted in a nonlinear, intersectional analysis—capturing complexities rather than avoiding them.
• The Southern feminist lens spotlights interlinkages across gender, class, labor, migration, and macroeconomic policy, addressing how gendered relations have "material consequences" and are inseparable from policy impacts.
  • Example: India’s case study (by Ritu Dewan) began as macroeconomic analysis but expanded to migration and social protection, revealing intertwined vulnerabilities.

  "Policies don’t operate neatly, coherently, or individually. They were constantly evolving… so implicated in these policies, in these complexities and messes, are the gendered and social complexities of class and power." — Damien P. Gock (14:55)

4. Corporate Capture and the Erosion of Public Goods (17:58–21:46)

• The pandemic saw massive public funding diverted into private corporate profits—especially in vaccine and medical supply production.
  • This was a vivid example of what DAWN had previously written about as "corporate capture."
• Social protection even in progressive countries (like South Africa and India) was shaped or curtailed by austerity measures, illustrating the reduction of state support—a form of corporate-friendly discipline.

  "All that public funding became part of corporate response… public resources went into these private corporations and then profited from a human pandemic. I think that's the most dramatic example of corporate capture that I've seen." — Masaya Llavaneras Blanco (18:20)

5. Labor Mobility and Migration During the Pandemic (23:15–27:35)

• The book addresses both global and internal labor mobility.
  • Example: Kiribati seasonal workers stranded in Australia and New Zealand faced job loss, visa insecurity, health risks, and lack of social protection due to lockdowns and border closures.
  • Internal migration crises are covered in chapters on China (migrant domestic workers) and India (internal migrants under austerity).

  "These seasonal workers were stranded in a country that was not their own, with no money, had no employment, had no comprehensive health coverage, and were in breach of their working conditions." — Damien P. Gock (25:30)

6. Social Movements and Opportunities for Change (27:35–30:40)

• Certain social movements leveraged the crisis to advance rights and organizing:
  • Malaysia: Domestic worker unions, forced online by the pandemic, unexpectedly grew their membership and advocacy impact via digital organizing.
  • Chile: Illustrates migrant and non-migrant organizing to resist exclusion, showing solidarity under pressure.

  "They actually made very important achievements in the context of the pandemic that seemed even impossible before the pandemic happened. That's a case of hope and organizing." — Masaya Llavaneras Blanco (28:14)

7. Commitment to Open Access and Activist Tools (31:12–37:52)

• Recognizing paywalls as barriers for Global South scholars and activists, DAWN made the entire book open access by dedicating their own resources.
  • "There is research about us that we don't have access to… DAWN would be remiss to repeat that story." — Masaya Llavaneras Blanco (32:10)
• The "Southern Feminist Toolkit for Activism" is a companion digital resource—a smart, clickable PDF designed to help activists, educators, and organizers navigate the book’s lessons and apply them practically across contexts.
  • The toolkit demystifies key themes (e.g., labor rights, macroeconomic analysis, organizing strategies) and helps bridge the gap between scholarship and activism.

8. Acknowledgments and Reflections (38:10–40:34)

• Deep gratitude to all 22 authors and contributors who worked on the project, many doing fieldwork while personally impacted by the pandemic.
• Special thanks to family and loved ones for their support during a tumultuous period.

9. What's Next for the Editors and DAWN? (40:46–43:01)

• DAWN is editing a new book on "global China" from a feminist perspective and is expanding work on feminist macroeconomics.
• Masaya is writing on labor mobilities between Haiti and the Dominican Republic and on how social reproduction intersects with authoritarianism.
• Damien is focusing on Pacific well-being and communities of care among the diaspora, especially for PhDs abroad.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Research Urgency:
  "We did what came natural to us, which was investigate what was happening… this huge disruption… we got into this book first, before it was a book, it was a research project out of urgency." — Masaya Llavaneras Blanco (05:27)

• On Methodology:
  "Collaboration was essential from the get go… to kind of build and weave those relationships in ways that were flexible and strong enough to sustain the process in a context of crisis." — Masaya Llavaneras Blanco (11:07)

• On Accessibility:
  "The curse of the paywall. So a lot of us from the south miss out on a lot relevant and current literature because of this." — Damien P. Gock (31:12)

• On Social Movements:
  "They actually managed to grow more [digitally] than they had been able to grow before the pandemic… important achievements that seemed even impossible before." — Masaya Llavaneras Blanco (28:14)

Timestamps for Important Segments

| Segment Topic | Time | |------------------------------------------------|-----------| | Introductions & DAWN Collective | 01:32–05:27 | | Book Genesis & Structure | 07:00–13:50 | | Southern Feminist Lens & Interlinkages | 13:50–17:58 | | Corporate Capture & Public Erosion | 17:58–21:46 | | Labor Mobility (Kiribati, China, India) | 23:15–27:35 | | Social Movements and Change Opportunities | 27:35–30:40 | | Open Access and the Southern Feminist Toolkit | 31:12–37:52 | | Gratitudes & Acknowledgment | 38:10–40:34 | | What’s Next — Future Projects | 40:46–43:01 |

Overall Tone and Language

• The episode is thoughtful, direct, and earnest, reflecting DAWN’s activist-academic sensibilities.
• There are numerous moments of warmth and solidarity, with a strong focus on collective effort, practical wisdom, and global justice.

For listeners new to these topics, the discussion is accessible, with the editors breaking down complex intersections of gender, policy, and global power—always centering the voices and realities of movements at the margins.