ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the initial governmental response to the Palme Assassination crisis and the management of the murder investigation during the first few months after the deed. Such an analysis provides an opportunity to explore the rapid succession of threat frames that emerged during this period. The analysis will be based on the cognitive-institutional process tracing strategy. The chapter describes a series of acute decision problems and identifies a number of threat frames for further analysis. It deals with some reflections on the political psychology of threat framing based upon the empirical findings. In retrospect, police leaders emphasise the symbolic importance of the funeral and the credibility issues at stake to explain the expensive precautions, rather than the substantive threat estimation. The Palme crisis presented both threats and opportunities to actors on the Swedish political scene. Actors and institutions which meet or exceed normative and performative expectations tend to maintain or increase credibility and legitimacy.
