My husband's family is military. Preparation is just, from that family perspective, it's just a part of what makes sense to do. You buy insurance for your house; you have a go bag.
For an entire populace, change, growth, and spontaneity were dangerous. Acting upon a personal desire, whispering a hidden longing, revealing your true feelings - all the human actions we think of as essential to a character - had be censored by the self lest they be punished by the state.

