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A moral panic can be defined as "the intensity of feeling expressed by a large number of people about a specific group of people who appear to threaten the social order at a given time."^[1] Stanley Cohen, author of the seminal Folk Devils and Moral Panics (1973), says moral panic occurs when "[a] condition, episode, person or group of persons emerges to become defined as a threat to societal values and interests."^[2] Those who start the panic when they fear a threat to prevailing social or cultural values, are known by researchers as "moral entrepreneurs", while the people who supposedly threaten the social order are known as a "folk devil." They are byproducts of controversies that produce arguments and social tension, or aren't easily discussed as some of these moral panics are taboo to many people.^[3] The media have long operated as agents of moral indignation, even if they are not self-consciously engaged in crusading or muckraking. Simply reporting the facts can be enough to generate concern, anxiety or panic.^[4]

Origins and use of the term

While many believe the term was coined by Stanley Cohen to describe press reporting and the reaction of the establishment to the behaviour of mods and rockers, it was actually first used by his colleague Jock Young when he used it in reference to the reaction to drug takers in Notting Hill.^[1]

Many sociologists have pointed out the differences between definitions of a moral panic for American and British sociologists. Kenneth Thompson has said that American sociologists tend to emphasize psychological factors whereas the British portray moral panics as crises of capitalism.^[5]

In Policing the Crisis: Mugging, the State and Law and Order (1978), Stuart Hall and his colleagues studied the reaction to the importation into the UK of the heretofore American phenomenon of mugging. Employing Cohen's definition of moral panic, Hall et al. theorized that the "rising crime rate equation" has an ideological function relating to social control. Crime statistics, in Hall's view, are often manipulated for political and economic purposes. Moral panics (e.g. over mugging) could thereby be ignited in order to create public support for the need to "police the crisis." The media play a central role in the "social production of news" in order to reap the rewards of lurid crime stories.^[6]

Characteristics

Moral Panics have several distinct features. The process by which these are created is best explained with Cohen's Deviancy Amplification Spiral:

Examples of use of the term

Satanic ritual abuse

Satanic ritual abuse is regarded by the majority of scholars as a series of moral panics originating in the U.S.^[7]^[8]^[9]^[10] Jewkes states that the reactions to pedophilia in the Western world have been cited as "the most significant moral panic of the last two decades."^[11]

Pogroms, purges and witch-hunts

War on Drugs

Some critics find moral panic in support for the War on Drugs. For example a Royal Society of Arts commission concluded that "the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, ... is driven more by 'moral panic' than by a practical desire to reduce harm."^[12] Similarly, support for video game and media regulation has been linked to moral panic.^[13]

Rainbow parties

A 2003 episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show claimed that there was a widespread fashion among teenage girls to take part in elaborate sex orgies named rainbow parties. Although fantastic from the outset, and despite the fact that it was never substantiated that even a single "rainbow party" had taken place before, nor even that a corresponding "urban myth" had been circulating among teenagers, the claim caused popular reverberations that have been described as "moral panic."^[14]

Criticism

In Folk Devils and Moral Panic, Cohen outlines some of the criticisms that have arisen in response to moral panic theory. One of these is of the term "panic" itself, as it has connotations of irrationality and a lack of control. Cohen maintains that "panic" is a suitable term when used as an extended metaphor. Another criticism is that of disproportionality. The problem with this argument is that there is no way to measure what a proportionate reaction should be to a specific action.^[15] Others have criticized Cohen's work stating that not all the folk devils expressed in his work are vulnerable or unfairly maligned. Jewkes has also raised issue with the term 'morality' and how it is accepted unproblematically in 'moral panics'.^[11]

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Contents

Origins and use of the term

Characteristics

Examples of use of the term

Satanic ritual abuse

Pogroms, purges and witch-hunts

War on Drugs

Rainbow parties

Criticism

See also

References

Further Reading

External links