Introduction to the Handbook on Space, Place and Law

At the time of writing the COVID-19 pandemic is rampant across the world. The pandemic has exposed not only our shared humanity, and very human vulnerability, but also the great diversity of circumstance across the globe and the enormous inequality that remains in and between regions and nations. The disastrous effects of COVID-19 have disproportionately affected those least able to cope, who are already marginalised, and maligned by poverty and discrimination, in part due to deficiencies in governance, and exacerbated by pre-existing Anglo- and Atlanto-centrism and racism (Devakumar et al. 2020).