The important take away from these sorts of restrictions, though, are such state powers set to end when the pandemic is controlled or terminated? I'm not from Australia, so I can't speak to their power systems, but almost every time our federal institutions take a more broader domestic power towards spying, restricting speech, restricting movement, etc. etc. those powers don't come back at the end of the panic, whatever that panic may have been. Some of those expanded powers (PRIZM) we have to find out about through leaks, to the detriment of the people who leaked the information for the greater good.
I guess I don’t understand this concern, because it doesn’t seem historically accurate.
There have been many pandemics in the past. Governments have responded in the past with aggressive quarantines. Yet, before this current pandemic, no country had aggressive quarantines in place.
These kinds of restrictions imposed by governments have historically disappeared with high reliability when the situation calling for them has ended.
Maybe, but in the past no government has had access to the tracking data we are freely allowing them to have to us.
I sound like I'm an anti vax conspiracy theorist, and I don't want to put that across, but there is a strong precedent for abuse of power in every government across the globe. A lot of draconian measures ease when the panic is over, but shadows of them seem to remain in place, at least in the U.S. (again, I can't speak for Australia).
EDIT:
Here's an example of how anti Covid measures are being used to stop protests.
> A lot of draconian measures ease when the panic is over, but shadows of them seem to remain in place, at least in the U.S
I'm not sure I fully buy that. What authoritarian powers were left in place as a hangover from the Spanish Flu emergency powers that governors wielded at the time? Historically, the executive of governments have had _incredible_ emergency powers during infectious diseases crises, but I don't know that I've seen those powers extended indefinitely.
I'm absolutely wary of handling governments unlimited and unchecked power, even in emergencies. I generally agree with your concerns about governments being reluctant to return powers once they're granted. But I do think it's important not to overact and refuse to allow any government action on the other side of the equation.
In the given Australia example, the state is exercising quarantine powers to stop an infectious disease. That sounds...not that novel or expansive to me. Nor does it seem like something the government will have an interest in beyond the pandemic. Quarantines, I think, are a really strong example of an _extreme_ limitation on liberty and expansion of the state's powers that are tolerated during a pandemic but absolutely abhorrent outside of one. It's also an example of powers that almost never are extended indefinitely beyond the pandemic.
> Here's an example of how anti Covid measures are being used to stop protests.
Turning to the cited article, I don't think it supports the position you're stating. The author appears to be discussing legislatures using the COVID emergency as a _distraction_, but doesn't present any anti-COVID measures being used to stop protests.
I'll admit that each of the bills passed and signed are an abhorrent restriction on the right to protest and the right to free speech and assembly. Accepted and granted. But none of those bills appear to be anti-COVID measures in any way. As far as I can tell from reviewing the legislation and reviewing contemporaneous articles, the only connection to COVID was the fact that the public was distracted.
The South Dakota bill for example (https://mylrc.sdlegislature.gov/api/Documents/69887.pdf) doesn't mention "COVID", or "pandemic". The only mention of "disease" is in the definition of intoxication (to explicitly say it is not a mental disease).
The Kentucky bill is similar (https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/record/20rs/hb44.html). It doesn't mention "COVID", "pandemic", or "disease", and doesn't appear in _any_ way to be designed as an anti-COVID measure.
The only anti-COVID measures discussed in the article by the author are praised as a measured and reasonable response. The only "use" of the pandemic by the legislatures was as a distraction.
I do agree that anti-COVID measures targeted at public protest should receive significantly more scrutiny than many other anti-COVID measures.
