News has been coming in in the last two hours of the terrible attack in Oslo. It is hard to believe such an assault can happen in Scandanavia. After years of taking off our shoes at the airport in the US, or spot-checks entering the subway, the risk of attacks is always lurking at the back of our minds in New York like a low buzz of static.
But now a major attack instead happens on a bright summer day in downtown Oslo, an ocean away from our expectations in every sense.
At this stage the most likely perpetrators are Al- qaeda or related entities.
Politicians and media are always quick to say that we should not overreact to such an attack, that the terrorists "have won" if we change in any way. But the most fundamental purpose of the state is, as Max Weber told us, the monopolization of legitimate violence - precisely to stop acts of violence by hostile entities like this. To contain the forces of violence and disorder, not make up excuses for inaction.
The state is supposed to stop a sanguinary state of nature, or the sight of rubble and broken glass on its main streets. If it cannot protect its citizens then its legitimacy is damaged. The underlying social contract means this cannot be violence seen as something to be just endured passively, like thunderstorms. If citizens cannot walk their own streets without fear, they ae not citizens. There is no freedom for anyone if ordinary citizens shudder in their houses or fret at boarding a train.
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