Moral Panics in Theory and Practice
You are looking at 51 - 60 of 66 items
The distinctiveness of Wales in terms of its political life and culture has grown considerably since the early 2000s (Mackay, 2010). Nevertheless, beneath the imagery of the definitive nation, Wales remains a complex and divided land in which a marginalised and demonised working class has come to characterise areas of Wales dominated by poverty and social exclusion. Such polarisation has a spatial dimension that is illustrated in the creation of new ghettos of prosperity and poverty that now dominate the Welsh socioeconomic terrain, and this ‘stigma of place’ permeates the identities of residents. The chapter begins by considering how moral panics about particular places create ‘spatial folk devils’. The creation of moral panics through political discourses and mediated forms is then explored in terms of contemporary representations. Drawing on research with mothers and their daughters in a marginalised Welsh locale, the chapter examines the ideology of unity alongside the divisions of everyday life, and the ways in which respectable and acceptable working-class femininities are negotiated against a pervasive discourse of lack, stigma and classed moral panics.
As Cohen (1980, p 9) contends, societies are subject to periods of moral panic in which ‘a condition, episode, person or group of persons emerges to become defined as a threat to societal values’. Moral panics are often discussed in relation to group criminality, incivility and disorder. However, arguably, the emphasis on collective behaviour has shifted to that of the morality of deficient individuals who require discipline; and these deficiencies are seen as a product of personal choice, where individuals are authors of their own immorality (Burney, 2005).
This chapter introduces a new subject into the moral panic literature – patient safety – and in doing so explores the ways in which moral panics around patient safety have been used by physicians as part of a deliberate strategy in order to bring about institutional transformation. It is important to note that the term ‘moral panic’ has a much longer lineage than is commonly thought to be the case. It first appeared in the Quarterly Christian Spectator in 1830, and then again in The Journal of Health Conducted by an Association of Physicians in 1831. In this journal, a French physician visiting Sunderland (in England) praised the English government for its approach to the cholera epidemic. He congratulated the government for not surrounding the town with a cordon of troops which as ‘a physical preventive would have been ineffectual and would have produced a moral panic far more fatal than the disease now is’ (unknown, 1831, p 180). The term was picked up much later, in 1964, with the Canadian sociologist Marshall McLuhan’s ground-breaking work on the influence of the media, and later expanded by Jock Young (1971) and Stan Cohen (1972). Given the historical nature of the phenomenon, it seems both unrealistic and unlikely to assume that moral panics are inherently media driven. However, it seems equally realistic and likely to assume that the media plays, at times, a key role, as we will see in the case-study examples that follow.
The chapter focuses on two case-study examples, anaesthesia as a specific medical intervention and healthcare more broadly, noting that there are many more possible cases of which ‘injury to the person’ is a subfield that could have been considered, including, for example, automotive safety, consumer-product safety and medical insurance.
In 1999 the Institute of Medicine published the report ‘To Err is Human’ which made the extraordinary claim that up 98,000 people suffered serious avoidable harm and mortality in the US Healthcare system. This claim has become integral to healthcare policy worldwide and is accepted in the highest ranking academic journals despite its dubious provenance. The evidence was derived by extrapolating from small studies, which used questionable methodology, to the population at large and had high emotive content with strong moral overtones. The social entrepreneurs behind the project are identified and discussed with the conclusion that how we treat vulnerable members of our society remains clouded by moral panic.
The ‘riots’ in England during August 2011 involved a level of public disturbance and destruction rarely seen in the United Kingdom. These events resulted in widespread speculation as to the causes of, and solutions to, the violence and looting. The public and media response could be seen as constituting a moral panic in relation to the people involved, particularly the young people who took part in the ‘riots’. This chapter explores the way in which ‘troubled families’ were portrayed as a cause of people’s involvement in the ‘riots’ and critically examines the implications of such understandings and responses to public unrest.
The ‘riots’ in England during August 2011 involved a level of public isturbance and destruction rarely seen in the United Kingdom. These events resulted in widespread speculation as to the causes of, and solutions to, the violence and looting. The public and media responses could be seen as constituting a ‘moral panic’ in relation to the people involved, particularly in terms of the scapegoating of the young people who took part in the ‘riots’. In this regard, Prime Minister David Cameron argued that the involvement of many young people was related to poor parenting and absent fathers, and stated that he would seek to ‘turn around the lives of the 120,000 most troubled families in the country’. This chapter explores the way in which ‘troubled families’ were portrayed as a cause of people’s involvement in the ‘riots’ and critically examines the implications of such understandings of and responses to public unrest. In particular, it demonstrates how the discourse and related initiatives depoliticise ‘riots’; how ‘problem families’ are portrayed as being a target for policy; and how the ‘riots’ were used to expand a policy direction already in place.
On 4 August 2011, Mark Duggan, a 29-year-old black man from Tottenham, was shot dead by police. On 6 August, a group of approximately 200 people gathered at Tottenham police station seeking urther information regarding the incident. There is evidence that police used aggressive tactics that provoked a reaction from the crowd (Reicher and Stott, 2011), which was followed by some members of the public setting police cars on fire, throwing various objects at the police and causing damage to certain commercial buildings.
We live in a world that is increasingly characterised as full of risk, danger and threat. Every day a new social issue emerges to assail our sensibilities and consciences. Drawing on the popular Economic Social and Research Council (ESRC) seminar series, this book examines these social issues and anxieties, and the solutions to them, through the concept of moral panic.
With a commentary by Charles Critcher and contributions from both well-known and up-and-coming researchers and practitioners, this is a stimulating and innovative overview of moral panic ideas, which will be an essential resource.
This chapter examines the Rotherham abuse scandal, which centres on the exploitation and abuse of (mostly) teenage girls between 1997 and 2013 in the South Yorkshire town of Rotherham and the publication of an official inquiry report (Jay, 2014) into the abuse and, more specifically, into agencies’ response to it. The report was released on 26 August 2014 and sparked intense media coverage. It is not difficult to see why. The report details the violent and sexual abuse and trafficking of minors, often over a number of years, carried out by groups of men who had befriended these children ‘on the streets’. This pattern of abuse is described as ‘child sexual exploitation’ (CSE). The report identifies 1,400 victims, emphasising that this is a ‘conservative estimate’. Around a third were in local council care or known to social services. The report is highly critical of the two key agencies in charge of CSE, namely the police and the council and its social and children's services. It paints a picture of serious failings and repeated inaction; Jay particularly criticises senior staff and management who actively ignored concerns about CSE.
This chapter considers the Rotherham abuse scandal from a moral panic perspective. It explores in detail media representations of the scale of the problem and the framing of blame, two key elements through which moral panics are instigated (Cohen, 2002). To this end, a limited press analysis was carried out in which the coverage of four newspapers was examined during the five days following the release of the Jay report.
This chapter examines the Rotherham abuse scandal which centred on the exploitation and abuse of (mostly) teenage girls between 1997 and 2013 in the South Yorkshire town of Rotherham and the publication of an official inquiry report into the abuse and, more specifically, into agencies’ response to it. The report was released on 26 August 2014 and sparked intense media coverage. Media representations of the scale of the problem and the framing of blame are explored in detail – two key elements through which moral panics are instigated.
We live in a world that is increasingly characterised as full of risk, danger and threat. Every day a new social issue emerges to assail our sensibilities and consciences. Drawing on the popular Economic Social and Research Council (ESRC) seminar series, this book examines these social issues and anxieties, and the responses to them, through the concept of moral panic. Revisiting Moral Panics begins with a commentary by Charles Critcher followed by twenty four contributions from both well-known and up-and-coming researchers and practitioners that address panics ranging from those surrounding the 2011 English riots to fears over ‘feral families’ in New Zealand. There are four parts: Gender and the family; Moral Panics in our time?: Childhood and youth; The State, government and citizens; and Moral crusades, moral regulation and morality. Each part is rounded off with an Afterword from a practitioner that lends a critical comment. Revisiting Moral Panics is a stimulating and innovative overview of moral panic ideas. It also provides a masterclass in their applicability, or otherwise, to contemporary anxieties and concerns.
Many of the individual and social problems that are characterised as moral panics are, in reality, illustrations of a breakdown in the legitimacy of the state. This Byte picks up a number of case-study examples - internet pornography; internet radicalisation; ‘chavs’; the Tottenham riots; patient safety - and explores each through the lens of moral panic ideas, with an appraisal of the work of Stuart Hall, one of the key thinkers in moral panics.