Beyond blame: leadership, collaboration and compassion in the time of COVID-19

As the COVID-19 pandemic confronts us with our interdependence and vulnerability, we can respond in distinctly different ways. Our fears may prompt blame and its rationalization, but our fears may also motivate inquiry and learning. Compassion and collaboration hang in the balance—shaped in part, we shall argue, by political leadership, scientific expertise, and emergent social solidarity. Blaming others may side-step responsibility, but it will not encourage or target actions in response to suffering. But admitting ignorance and the need to learn, supporting widespread testing, and following best available public health advice might cultivate broader public action and confidence—as evidenced both in exemplary public leadership and in shared actions of mutual aid like social distancing. We argue that public leadership can model and encourage—or discourage!—compassionate and collaborative action, and we examine a striking natural experiment: the parallel COVID-19 briefings of the public by President Trump’s White House Task Force and New York State’s Governor Andrew Cuomo. Although many of our arguments may have widespread applicability, this essay’s principal perspective is primarily based upon our experiences in North America, and it is therefore American-centric to a large extent.