The intensification of terrorist attacks in Europe, the worsening effects of the global economic crisis, the
constant attention to migratory flows in vast areas of the planet and the frequent environmental
disasters have turned back the spotlights on the “State of Emergency”. Far beyond the limits in which it
was traditionally relegated, “Emergency” paradoxically entered the ordinary public debate, with the
effect of a deeply transformation of the political mechanisms and processes of legitimacy. This article
aims to reflect on “Emergency” as a normal and normalized instrument of power legitimacy, by linking it
with (i) the organicists imaginaries related to the concept of crisis, (ii) the reframing of social problems
in terms of security and (iii) the political and legal responses justified with the arguments of urgency,
exception and necessity