Rethinking the World Today: Cities and Regions in a Post-Covid World,

This talk will assess the role of three pandemic-related forces —the social scar-ring instilled by the pandemic; the lockdown as a forced experiment; and the need to secure the urban built environment against future risks— in this trans-formation both at the macro- and micro-geographic scale. It will be argued that, at the macro-geographic scale, the pandemic is unlikely to significantly alter the winner-take-all economic geography and spatial inequality of the global total system. At the micro-geographic scale, however, it may bring about a se-ries of social changes in the structure and morphology of cities, suburbs, and metropolitan regions. The durability and extent of these changes will depend on the timeline and length of the pandemic.