What to expect from society facing a pandemic? Freud-Canguilhem

Abstract

Considering the denials to the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as the disrespect for the sanitary recommendations of social isolation, this work seeks to provide, from the perspective of Sigmund Freud and Georges Canguilhem, conceptual operators for the circumscription of such movements,antagonistics to the maintaining of a life in society. From a Freudian perspective, we situate how the phenomenon of regression triggered in the face of environmental contingencies reveals vicissitudes in the formation of a community engaged with itself. Considering Canguilhem's perspective, we will see how society, unlike a living organ or organism, has no intrinsic purpose, thereby generating endless debates about how its ordination should be. With that, we observed that the boycott movements to the recommendations of health authorities are consistent with a society that is not altruistic (Freud) and that only survives through crises regarding to its purposes (Canguilhem). In the end, we propose that the notion of vital normativity contributes to the proposition of a life in society whose creation and incessant review of their ways of existence can be a tool to prevent, or postpone, their collapse.