Ten Years after 9/11: On the political response to the `risk of terror'

Abstract

This commentary deals with the question of what typical patterns are characteristic of the political and administrative response to the `risk of terror'. The key assumption is that the `new' transnational terrorism is not only in itself a risk that is difficult to calculate but is furthermore perceived as enforcing those catastrophic risks which generally exist in modern high-tech societies. This combination of risk and `risk enforcement' explains why in such societies terrorism could have such a big impact which shapes the ways of reaction described here. As a conclusion, the article advocates to add a political conflict perspective to the dominant, primarily technocratic risk perspective.