Ghatak provides a most lucid addition to the literature on the governance of risk in modern America. He masterfully traces the historical roots of new forms of scientific and legal categories and knowledge about perceived dangerousness and risk, from the `psychopathic` criminal, to new ways of constructing the problems of immigration and terrorism. He adds vital new concepts which help ... Read moreus understand and perhaps moderate the tensions between anticipating risk and danger before it engulfs us and holding to the democratic processes and values that most of us hold dear.
Kevin Stenson, University of Kent, UK Threat Perceptions recovers for us the the complex mix of political, legal and scientific events in the 19th and 20th centuries, behind the present techniques of risk surveillance and control. Ghatak shows us that while these techniques are vulnerable in their dependence on the shifting grounds of law, politics, and science, they are remarkably robust in their ability to recirculate and reappear. This book will be of great value to anyone studying or worrying about our increasingly intrusive security state.
Jonathan Simon, University of California at Berkeley Show Less