Caging identified threats : Exploring pitfalls of state preparedness imagination

Abstract

Preparedness is a vital, future-oriented condition for societies. The way in which a society becomes prepared depends on how the threat landscape, as well as the needs and means to respond to it, are perceived. A State's imagination plays a crucial role in perceiving the threat landscape and defining preparedness measures. This study focused on how this preparedness imagination works, and illustrated this through macro-documentary material on Finland's preparedness. It found that preparedness imagination assumes that threats and the preparedness apparatus have specific basic characteristics. By reducing complexity, uncertainty, and unpredictability, the imagination adjusts threats to suit the functioning of the preparedness apparatus. Preparedness imagination manages to convey the notion of having a comprehensive grip on the threat landscape, but it expresses no concerns for what remains beyond its comprehension. The study concludes that preparedness imagination is efficient in managing threats as they are identified, and in generating reassuring perceptions of security, but that it is prone to a vulnerability that develops beyond the reach of the imagination and is attached to its strengths.