Anomie and Timing
Vilhjálmur Bjarnason

Abstract
Anomie is a concept referring to chaos in a society where solidarity and conventional organization, particularly that relating to criteria and values, have weakened and been replaced by lawlessness. Anomie refers to a social situation that occurs when changes are so swift and the social situation in its wake becomes so alien that codes of conduct and values, which the general public has been accustomed to, lose their context in respect of the social reality. The author of this article is of the opinion that institutional anomie occurs when society's institutions, directly or indirectly, acknowledge principal changes in the construction of law, customs and practices, subsequently resulting in social chaos. Manifestations of anomie can be creative constructions of law and creative accounting. This article will illustrate that the privatization of the Icelandic commercial banks has several characteristics of anomie. When the financial system was privatized a process of anomie began in the society, ending upon the collapse of the financial system.

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