Compelling Historical Narratives and Moral Panics

Louis Kontos, John Jay College (CUNY)

Social problems become moral problems when there is the perception that the cause is deviance – which is to say, people not playing by the rules. This includes the types of problems which reflect the normal workings of capitalist political economy, including poverty, inequality, environmental degradation, and war. Such problems, which put society itself at risk, are normally framed in moral terms in the mainstream, public, political, discourse. They appear therein next to topics which are successfully framed as problems because they offend the moral sensibilities of a dominant social group, like recreational drug use or pornography. In each case, there is an attempt to gain public support for the idea that something should be done now about a particular social problem. A sense of urgency is created typically through dramatic narratives and contrived exemplars. By the same token, the problem must appear new and must be tethered to deviant stereotypes. The following paper examines the prospect of ongoing moral panic in the American context.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 129. The Politics of Language