Politica moderna e insicurezza contemporanea:la domanda di protezione nelle società liberali.

Mainstream sociological literature stressed the connections between insecurity and globalization. Reassuring the people and dealing with its fears has always been a prerogative of modern political power. As Foucault noticed, security technologies are the very condition of liberalism. They were developed in the first age of capitalism, in order to rule the circulation of people, goods and vehicles. As Joseph Stiglitz points out, contemporary globalization is characterized by an unprecedented growth of the amount of goods, capitals, services and people circulating worldwide. National States are however unable to regulate these flows. As a result, insecurity spreads through contemporary liberal societies and feeds the middle classes’ fear of crime. People’s calls for safety often turn to be illiberal. Still, the fear of crime is socially constructed by the media, the polls and a false use of criminal records in public debate. Even social theory often exceeds in emphasising the growth of crime, as is the case of Garland’s notion of “high crime societies”. Taking seriously the call for protection in liberal societies could instead entail institutions in encouraging the development and the implementation of new cultural and political paradigms that may help to understand social complexity and to deal with it.