A large part of this book has been written during the Covid-19 pandemic, and as such it would be remiss of us not to briefly reflect on the implications it may have for intergenerational relations and the concept of kid power as discussed in the book. The virus is fuzzy in terms of its direct effects on the health of children and adults, but there is some evidence to suggest that younger children are less likely to be seriously affected than adults (UKRI, 2020). While generation is thus to some extent a variable in an analysis of the health effects, the political and social effects are more universal. Across many countries, the onset of the pandemic in the first few months of 2020 resulted in a sudden and absolute rise of overt state action with the imposition of national and regional lockdowns. While the levels and forms of enforcement of these restrictions varied across different countries, power was nevertheless crude, top-down and one-dimensional with the state justifying the restrictions on people's physical movements in terms of restricting the spread of the virus. Moreover, the lockdown placed similar physical restrictions on children and adults. Where adults and children were in a position to move around, there were (and still are) major social implications with social distancing a familiar reference point now for both adults and children when negotiating common and routine interactions outside of households. Interactions among children are now more likely to be discouraged as parents and, in some instances, teachers extend their safeguarding responsibilities to protecting children from the virus. State power is also clearly apparent in the way that physical restrictions are lifted or reimposed, and more routine social interactions with others outside of the household allowed or limited.

While it is still, at the time of writing, an open question how the pandemic will affect the themes we have discussed in the book more long-term, we may already now speculate on some of the implications, at least in the short term. For example, in Chapter 3 we argued that child-centredness in school settings illustrates a more Foucauldian notion of power, where social interactions rival more traditional curriculums and teacher-centred pedagogy in regulating children's schooling and development.