Business as usual like never before! Continuity, rupture and anxiety management in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum campaign

Abstract

Ontological security-seeking has traditionally been considered to rest upon the stability and continuity of core auto-biographical narratives and everyday routines. ‘Critical situations’ which fundamentally destabilise these foundations of ontological security have thus hitherto carried a negative valence. Constitutional referenda proposing a radical re-organisation of collective political identities and daily life, therefore, are intriguing. A source of severe consternation for some, for others, potential change is positive, even thrilling. This article investigates this puzzling contrast, drawing on Ontological Security Studies’ (OSS) recent recentring of Existentialist thought and debates exploring the heterogenous potential of anxiety, and utilising the 2014 referendum on Scottish independence and the strategies for anxiety management embedded in the pro-independence ‘Yes’ campaign. Through analysis of dominant discourses grounding the argument for independence, findings demonstrate the simultaneous deployment of contradictory anxiety management strategies: independence was framed as a pathway to escape the instability and uncertainty of the status quo; as a pathway to continuity; and as a chance to embrace anxiety, to relish the opportunity and excitement of change. This article thus contributes to the prevailing critique of OSS’ over-privileging of stability and continuity in ontological security-seeking, yet problematises ‘either/or’ approaches to understanding anxiety management in critical situations and beyond.