When the pandemic is finally over, what will remain is not only 800,000 or more Americans dead but also a country too riven to appreciate our survival and a world where even the more privileged are surrounded by avoidable death and suffering.

In her book “March of Folly,” the historian Barbara Tuchman describes civilizations that collapsed not because of insurmountable challenges but because “wooden-headedness” took over: Those in charge were unable to muster the will and vision to make the necessary course corrections in the face of difficulties.

But that’s not the only possibility.

After the horrors of World Wars I and II and the Great Depression between them, there was rebuilding of democracies, including constructing a public sphere geared toward preventing the rise of fascism, an expanded safety net and great reductions in income inequality. It wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t what you’d guess would come next, looking at the smoldering ruins of 1945.