It is far too early to write the history of the pandemic or to gauge its social consequences. But it is time for the first explorations, for test drilling, as carried out in the fifteen essays of this thematic booklet on History and Society. How does the relationship between closeness and distance change, what does the crisis mean for the state, for democracy and civil rights, for social policy and social inequality? How are the weights shifting in Europe, and which global experiences and upheavals should we consider, from China to Latin America? Historians are experts not only for the past,...