US presidential candidate Obama used the evolving crisis to his advantage, attacking his opponent, John McCain, for declaring repeatedly that the ‘fundamentals of our economy are strong’. Obama did not, however, win the election on a bad economy alone. Moreover, President Obama found it hard to exploit the crisis to further his political agenda (his stimulus bill was watered down considerably to please Republicans). If anything, the continuing crisis is seriously hampering his reform objectives (think of a new health system or a greener climate).

The global financial crisis did come in handy for those leaders who were already facing an economic downturn due to longstanding vulnerabilities. Those leaders were relatively quick to recognise the global financial crisis, making sure to stress its ‘unprecedented’ and exogenous nature. In a similar vein, we can conclude that the global financial crisis relieved some leaders of the responsibility for dealing with complex policy problems that could now be branded ‘unaffordable under the current circumstances’. While all this can be categorised as a form of crisis exploitation, it has little to do with the timely use of ‘opportunity windows’ (Kingdon 1997) to push through otherwise unpalatable or infeasible reforms.

The dearth of targeted and timely reforms in the wake of a global crisis—supposedly a great time for deep reform (Hall 1993)—suggests crisis exploitation might be harder or less prevalent than theory sometimes suggests it is (Kingdon 1997). In spite of cheerful comments that a ‘good crisis should not be wasted’ (‘il faut utiliser une crise’), few fundamental proposals were successfully initiated to redesign the financial system.

The idea that leaders can and do exploit crises to further their political interests thus merits renewed scrutiny (cf. Boin and ’t Hart 2000). A successful effort would require a serious understanding of crisis dynamics; leaders would have to grasp how and why these crises escalate and what they can do to arrest the process. Moreover, they must have a firm grasp of the way journalists, opposition leaders and interested citizens perceive and assess their frames and actions. They would have to persuade people that they could shift a crashing economy this or that way.

This book shows that crisis exploitation is not without risks. Leaders who try can become caught in so-called credibility gaps. For instance, emphasising external causes might divert attention from home-grown failures, but it also undermines the legitimacy of subsequent reform proposals. Overplaying the crisis to push through a reform package can create expectations that the proposed reforms cannot meet. Botched efforts to exploit a crisis might fuel public cynicism with regard to the functioning and performance of the political system.