Many have claimed that the response to the COVID-19 pandemic has led us to a world similar to Part 3 of Atlas Shrugged: governments enforcing draconian measures, state control of the economy, widespread pessimism and gloom, and rapid economic decline. Is this the case, or is it that those concerned about individual freedom are perhaps over-reacting and life will gradually go back to normal?

In her lecture ‘Is Atlas Shrugging?’ in 1964, Ayn Rand claimed that ‘Atlas Shrugged is not a prophecy of our unavoidable destruction, but a manifesto of our power to avoid it, if we choose to change our course’. Do we still have time to do so, or is it too late?