"Four meals from anarchy" sounds like the sort of greatly exaggerated rhetoric that gets attention from the press, internet forums, and people handing out grants. It hits the primal panic about food shortage. If food is the only concern, how is looting supermarkets "anarchy"? It's just a particular type of merchandise. It's not like people are getting killed. After the power is restored, the corporations will get their insurance pay off. The disruption of fuel, money, sewage, and other basic services may have a much bigger impact than running out of food. Some hospital patients may die quickly if there is no electricity. So I'm not disputing the conclusions of the study, just the tag line.

Cities in the US have endured blackouts, sometimes lasting for days. If there was any sort of violence, it was because of an underlying, pre-existing problem. I was in a extended blackout, and I seem to recall the crime rate went down and the backyard grill party rate went up. But then these were local blackouts, and other areas could ship stuff over. If the whole country's grid went down, that'd be a different story.