Everybody wants to do something. Op-Ed pieces arrive daily, written by young and old alike, people who are world-famous and people you never heard of, embracing the pandemic for the opportunity it provides to bring about radical change. I have not made a list, but I would bet that most put global climate change and social justice as the most urgent priorities, ahead of the resolution of local crises in Africa or the Middle East with the potential to cause a world war. Some of us are more concerned to prevent bad things from happening – power grabs by authoritarians would be the top of my list, followed by another round of austerity cuts to education and health  – rather than to make good things happen; perhaps I can be forgiven, being an historian.