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The present research investigates certain psychosocial reactions to the feeling of material vulnerability. On the basis of theories stemming from the psychology of legitimacy and of sociological approaches to social precariousness, we want to underline a double dynamic of vulnerability. Results come from a representative study on the legitimacy of state intervention in Switzerland (N = 769). They show that on the one hand, vulnerability incites individuals to perceive a disorderly and dangerous society which leads them to support disciplinary state action. On the other hand, vulnerability contributes to the recognition of illegitimate structural inequality which calls for state regulation based on the redistribution of resources.