ABSTRACT
Rampage shootings are phenomena that have spread across the globe since the end of the 1980s. This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the concepts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book. The book focuses on Western Europe which discusses some conventional wisdom resulting from the repeated failure of policy makers in the United States to draw lessons from policy failures in the area of gun policy. It provides the first systematic cross-national comparison of the varying political processes triggered by rampage shootings in Western Europe. The book addresses the question of why rampage shootings are sometimes immediately identified as a policy failure resulting from dysfunctional gun control measures, while they pass by without a political debate at other times. The empirical evidence presented in this book clearly supports the finding by other scholars that 'even in the wake of destabilizing crisis episodes, incremental rather than radical change is the name of the game in pluralistic polities'.
