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This document is an introduction to a special issue of the journal Critical Criminology titled "The Criminalization-to-Deportation Pipeline in the United States." The issue aims to challenge traditional approaches to immigration enforcement and deportation by examining the processes and impacts of the criminalization of immigrants with non-immigration-related criminal records. The articles in the issue draw on critical criminology frameworks to explore the structural inequalities and racial inequities that shape crimmigration outcomes, as well as the resistance and responses of impacted communities. The issue also highlights the limitations of sanctuary policies in protecting noncitizens targeted by the criminal legal system. [Extracted from the article]

Since the passage of the Homeland Security Act in 2002, the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has used police and carceral power to entrench its operations against criminalized immigrant communities in New York City. This article argues that to understand this process, homeland security actions must be seen as a form of symbolic and physical violence that ascertains legitimacy through an internal dialogue within the very bureaucracies of the state itself, and are sanctified by broader historic structural relations, as per Bourdieu's understanding of the state manifesting in bureaucratic and discursive ways. Through an examination of 148 federal documents, this article will conduct an institutional ethnography-informed intertextual analysis of how ICE has expanded into New York City, arguing that through the courting of broader moral panics concerning race, national security, and crime, a Homeland Security State has converted migration management into security management, reifying a binary between the "good" and "bad" immigrant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The sudden outbreak of COVID-19 and consequent quarantine policies have substantially altered family lives worldwide. Potential associations between parental negative emotional expressions towards the pandemic, family factors, and child psychological adjustment remain under-explored. Accordingly, the goal of the present study was to examine the relation between maternal panic over COVID-19 and children's depressive symptoms, with a focus on the potential moderating role of children's daily routines during a period of strict quarantine. Participants were N = 1,589 children (Mage = 13.13 years, SD = 1.54; 50.7% girls) and their mothers, from Zhengzhou, Henan Province, in Mainland China. Data were collected in April of 2020, when school closure policies were in effect. Mothers reported their panic over COVID-19 and children reported their depressive symptoms and daily routines during the quarantine period. Overall, results indicated a significant positive association between maternal panic over COVID-19 and child depressive symptoms. However, maintaining regular daily routines was found to be a significant moderator of this association, with higher levels of daily routines attenuating the link between maternal panic reactions and child psychological distress (i.e., buffering effect). The results highlight the protective role of regular daily routines in promoting psychological adjustment among Chinese children during the COVID-19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The greatest conceptual challenge that moral panic studies has struggled with over the past half century is the problem of disproportion. Since the field's inception, moral panics have been conceptualized as disproportionately conservative overreactions to ostensibly insignificant problems. It did not take long for critics, many of whom were working in moral panic studies or related fields of inquiry, to point out that disproportion is construed in a normative rather than empirical manner, and to supplement the conventional focus on conservative overreactions by drawing attention to either conservatively conditioned underreactions (missing panics) or socially progressive overreactions that are cultivated on the political left rather than the right (good moral panics). This article explains how the dynamics of disproportionate social reactions are more complicated than conventional moral panic scholars and their critics alike have recognized. By theorizing the nuances involved in disproportionate social reactions, the article develops a provisional framework to encourage theoretical and conceptual investigations into different kinds of moral boundary violations. The focus of analysis is on the problem of disproportion as it appears in moral panic studies, but scholars working with a broader range of realist, materialist, and/or critical perspectives will recognize and identify with the normative challenges posed by the problem of disproportion in their respective areas of inquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This document is a keynote address that honors the life and work of John Hagedorn, a prominent figure in critical criminology. The speaker discusses Hagedorn's contributions to critical gang studies and shares personal anecdotes about their relationship. Hagedorn's work focused on challenging stereotypes and examining the social, economic, and political contexts of gang subcultures. He emphasized the importance of understanding and addressing the prevailing conditions in marginalized communities, and advocated for collaborative research methodologies. The document also highlights Hagedorn's commitment to humanism and his critique of the criminalizing projections of the social control industry. The text discusses John's work as a criminologist, including his critique of welfare services and his role as an expert witness in court cases. John believes that the criminal justice system can be improved through solid social scientific evidence and empathetic interviews. His work also focuses on the global impact of capitalism and neoliberal policies on marginalized communities, particularly in relation to gangs and crime. The text emphasizes the importance of continuing John's work and advocating for social justice. [Extracted from the article]

This editorial from Critical Criminology discusses various global crises, including state crimes and the criminal charges faced by an authoritarian president in the United States. It criticizes the justice system for favoring the powerful and highlights the lack of accountability for crimes committed by the elite. The editorial also mentions the growing protests in support of Palestine and questions the legitimacy of elite-dominated systems of power. It concludes by announcing upcoming articles on topics such as the incarceration of women, racial capitalism, and crimmigration. [Extracted from the article]

Anxiety disorders are the most prevalent disorders among youth and understanding cognitive vulnerabilities for these disorders is crucial for early prevention and treatment. The present study examined the role of intolerance of uncertainty (IU) in predicting the severity of anxiety disorder symptoms among a sample of Iranian youth. The relationships between IU and anxiety disorder symptoms among youth [N = 683, ages 8–18, M (SD)age= 14.02 (2.43); 58.07% girls] with and without anxiety disorders, and their parents [N = 676, ages 27–58, M (SD)age= 40.63 (5.72); 61.8% female], were examined. Significant associations were found between youth- and parent-report IU and youth anxiety disorder symptoms. Youth with higher scores on total IU and prospective/inhibitory IU dimensions had significantly higher levels of anxiety disorder symptoms. Furthermore, youth-reported prospective/inhibitory IU were significantly related to specific youth anxiety and related disorder symptoms including generalized anxiety, separation anxiety, physical injury fears, obsessive-compulsive, social anxiety and panic/agoraphobia disorder symptoms. Findings provide cross-sectional support for the role of IU as a transdiagnostic feature in predicting a wide range of anxiety disorder symptoms in youth. Implications for future clinical applications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Moral panics around the issue of sex trafficking are not new, as human trafficking itself has roots in the moral concern over the prostitution of white women. However, in modern times the growth of social media has enabled sex trafficking conspiracies to quickly emerge and easily spread. Scant literature has explored how social media now plays a role in generating moral panics around sex trafficking. This paper uses tweets about the #WayfairGate conspiracy as a case study to analyze this issue. Findings reveal that moral panics generated through social media still follow the basic elements of a moral panic. Themes of religion and patriotism are also found. Further, the use of technology enables the fast spread of misinformation, generates stereotypes about both sex trafficking and human trafficking more broadly, and acts as a gateway introduction to other conspiracies. Such conspiracies should not be dismissed as they have the ability to impact public opinion and shape policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research demonstrates that, since the beginning of contemporary US cities, the rental market has been a site of regulation and material disadvantage for residents racialized as non-White. We know much less, however, about the other side of the coin: rental housing and those racialized as White. In this paper, I use the panic over race suicide in the early twentieth century – the perceived decline in the birth rate among Anglo-Saxon women coupled with the putative high rates of fertility of immigrant women – as a case to demonstrate how various social actors used rental housing to regulate the sexualities of (1) immigrant women (who were racialized as non-White); and (2) women racialized as White. A variety of social actors sought to reform the physical conditions and arrangements of tenements that they associated with large immigrant families and discipline residents. At the same time, developers built new buildings that were more amenable to children and landlords offered financial incentives to have babies to women racialized as White. By illuminating these bifurcated racialized practices, this article adds to work demonstrating that rental housing can be adapted and adopted for various political racialized projects. The article also reveals rental regulations and domestic space as a hitherto unknown mechanism for subsidizing Whiteness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This article examines recent moral panics over sex education in Uganda from historical perspectives. Public outcry over comprehensive sexuality education erupted in 2016 over claims that children were being taught "homosexuality" by international NGOs. Subsequent debates over sex education revolved around defending what public figures claimed were national, religious, and cultural values from foreign infiltration. Methods: This paper is grounded in a survey of Uganda's two English-print national newspapers (2016–2018), archival research of newspapers held at Uganda's Vision Group media company (1985–2005), analyses of public rhetoric as reported in internationally and nationally circulating media, textual analysis of Uganda's National Sexuality Education Framework (2018), formal interviews with Ugandan NGO officers (3), and semi-structured interviews with Ugandan educators (3). Results: Uganda's current panic over sex education reignited longstanding anxieties over foreign interventions into the sexual health and rights of Ugandans. We argue that in the wake of a 35-year battle with HIV/AIDS and more recent controversies over LGBT rights, both of which brought international donor resources and governance, the issue of where and how to teach young people about sex became a new battleground over the state's authority to govern the health and economic prosperity of its citizens. Conclusions: Ethno- and religio-nationalist rhetoric used to oppose the state's new sexuality education policy was also used to justify sex education as a tool for economic development. Policy Implications: Analyzing rhetoric mobilized by both supporters and detractors of sex education reveals the contested political terrain policy advocates must navigate in Uganda and other postcolonial contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has been well-established that, in the USA, the news media contributes to the construction of moral panics regarding the use and users of various types of drugs. In this study, we utilize the moral-panic framework to understand how the media depicts drug use in Malaysia. We used content analysis of two widely read English-language Malaysian newspapers to explore how drug use and drug users are depicted and portrayed. Broadly, we find that Malaysian news media tends to overemphasize legal issues while underemphasizing health issues associated with drug use, drug treatment, and harm reduction interventions. This type of coverage has likely contributed to a moral panic surrounding drug use in Malaysia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores a high-profile review of cases of alleged historical investigatory police bias in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, referred to in The New York Times article, "When Gangs Killed Men for Sport: Australia Reviews 88 Deaths." The title of the article contains the terms of a well-known feature of moral panic—a discovered crime fact and demand for an enforcement response disproportionate to the fact. Our analysis explores the response to the review of the list of cases, Strike Force Parrabell, as an illustration of runaway constructionism. Demand group-interest in the positive designation of the cases (as bias crime) was a means of acknowledging the prejudicial conduct of police during a time of wider attitudinal change. In spearheading the verification of this list of cases, demand groups and crusaders placed a high semiotic burden beyond its capacity as a comparable objective measure. The fitness of the list of 88 cases as a totem for police and societal wrongdoing requires evidence regarding disproportionality based on valid and reliable measures. Despite worldwide interest in NSW for its comparative high ranking in gay bias homicides, however, such ranking does not exist. Nonetheless, despite the impossibility that it stands in as proof of decades long prejudice, corruption or criminal negligence, the list of cases appears to do so anyway. As such, it is illustrative of the occupation of media frames and formats by weak data or of the runaway character of crime stories in an era of "fake news." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article deals with denunciations from people in the city of Timişoara, Romania. It focuses on Cristian Brâncovan, a so-called national champion of justice and the author of an online campaign against pickpockets that started in 2016. He has photographed suspects, published their photographs on his Facebook page, and occasionally harassed them in the street. Most, if not all, of his suspects were of Roma origins. The article also examines denunciations made anonymously to the Timişoara Local Police that the police then use to legitimize the arrests, evictions, and harassment of marginalized groups. Denouncing is regarded as a civic act, one by which the denouncer fulfills his/her/their duty as a citizen and contributes to public order and security. As such, the article highlights the active role of the population at the grassroots level to articulate the discourses and practices of moral panic. I argue that such practices are an instrument through which the Romanian middle class upholds its need for an ethical form of politics. The middle class in Romania uses denunciation as a way to enact, speak, and solicit security during episodes of moral panic. By demanding security, the Romanian middle class enforces a set of "civilized" principles against two distinct, yet related, "others"—the communist past and the underprivileged precariat. In this way, denunciations reinforce the state's repression against marginal groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Informed by a moral panic perspective, I analyze the music labeling debate in the United States from the mid 1980s until the early 1990s. Instigated by the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC), a voluntary group set up in 1985 by several politically well-connected women, this peculiar chapter in the control of music led to a hearing in the U.S. Senate and produced an intense debate, involving members of the community and musicians, litigation in the courts and legal discussions, police actions, as well as research by academic experts. The moral panic faded rather quickly after a warning label for music recordings was adopted, which remains in place today. This paper presents an effort in cultural criminology to make sense of this episode in the social control of music and argues that a historical approach to moral panics, conceived as cultural struggles, has important analytical advantages because of its relative detachment from the immediacy of an intensely debated social concern. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A growing number of studies show that the advent of the Internet has transformed the organisational life of crime, with many academic and non-academic articles and reports describing various types of organisational structures involved in cybercrimes as "organised crime". Other researchers are more critical in applying the organised crime label to cybercrimes. These debates are not merely speculative and scholastic but have a real practical significance, as over-estimating organised crime involvement can attract more resources (which might end up being allocated in a less efficient way), additional legal powers, and support from the general public. This study aims to further this path of inquiry by investigating whether the advancement of the cyber-organised crime narrative in the UK can be identified also in the media discourse. More specifically, this study will analyse UK press to explore to what extent "moral panic" can be identified, how primary definers use particular tactics and rhetorical constructions, and what are the dominant consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a historical account of the ‘pickup artists’ (PUA) phenomenon, tracing the origins back to the early 1970s when more liberal attitudes towards sexuality were on the rise in the West. Today PUA advice not only includes information about seduction techniques, but also programs about self-improvement or so-called ‘inner game’. Seduction and dating gurus can be found across the internet—from individual bloggers to dating coaches and relationship experts—all providing niche services and products on how to seduce and/or have fulfilling relationships with women. By addressing the moral panics around the PUA discourse, the paper seeks to illustrate the connection between second wave feminism, as a discourse increasingly interested in the idea of ‘gender egalitarianism’ and the popularity of seduction techniques for men based on emerging scientific research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Issues of sexual abuse, predation and rape have received an increased degree of attention over the last decade and as a result have overshadowed similarly offensive crimes. Various highly publicized cases of sexual violence against women and children have gripped both the United States and the United Kingdom and have resulted in the implementation of sexual violence laws. Media coverage of an 'epidemic' of sexual violence has led some to question whether the frenzy surrounding these publicized cases has created a 'fear factor' among parents and caregivers, begging the question as to whether the incidence of sexual violence has increased or whether the heightened sensitivity is a result of increased media reporting. This article examines approximately 12 years of aggregate sexual abuse prevalence data (crimes reported to the police) in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and compared prevalence change points and sexual offense law implementation. The article then examines the possible theory of whether Sarah's Law could potentially to be a result of increased fear or a moral panic. Findings indicate sex crime rates were declining prior to the law's implementation, lending cautious support to the proposition that the genesis of Sarah's Law may have been due to fear, rather than actual increases in sexual crimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The red-blue state and urban-rural narratives-which depict that people living in red states and rural areas oppose pro-LGB policies-are popular frames for describing variation in public opinion of LGB policies by geographic region. In a test case of a red state, we examine public opinion of pro-LGB policies to assess the accuracy of the red-blue and urban-rural narratives. Using data from a survey of Nebraskans ( n = 1608), we found that public opinion was more nuanced than the red state narrative allows but that urban and rural respondents reported significantly different opinions of pro-LGB policies. Rural people, however, were not unsupportive of all pro-LGB policies. Among all Nebraskans, support was higher for policies to protect LGB people from housing and job discrimination while support was lower for marriage and adoption rights. We discuss what these findings mean for public policy, urban and rural LGB individuals, and future public opinion studies of LGB issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent social and legal responses to novel psychoactive drugs (NPDs) have been attributed to media panics rather than these substance's actual harms. NPDs, including botanical substances new to Western markets such as Salvia divinorum, newly synthesized analogues such as synthetic cannabinoids and 'bath salts,' and new ways of administering drugs, such as combining prescription cough syrup with soda ('purple drank') have been the target of various forms of legislation at the state and/or federal level. We systematically examine print media coverage of NPDs in the U. S. between 2005 and 2013 to determine whether media attention was temporally associated with legislative change. Results indicate that each drug had a brief window during which it was the focus of sensationalistic reporting. In addition, federal legislation banning synthetic cannabinoids and 'bath salts' appear to be closely linked to media reporting as spikes in coverage both preceded and followed the bans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Joseph L. Albini (1930-2013) is a central figure in the historiography and criminology of organized crime and one of the leading revisionists critical of the traditional, centralized paradigm of organized crime rooted in the structural-functional approaches dominating sociology from the 1940s to 1980s. Albini argued that the Mafia was a socially-constructed entity that took on a life above and beyond its actual manifestations, thereby serving a vital role and function in political and social discourse in the United States. Albini used interdisciplinary theoretical perspectives and a mixture of social scientific and historical research methods to analyze data derived from a breadth of documentary sources and underworld and upperworld informants. This allowed Albini to deconstruct the historical and contemporary mythologies about a centralized national Mafia and to develop an alternative framework to evaluate organized crime in its complex and ever-evolving manifestations. Albini also advanced innovative critical criminological approaches that influenced the work of his contemporaries and scholars of later generations. Albini's later work 1) explored the impact of globalization on organized crime including transnational alliances between career criminals, terrorist networks and the security apparatuses of various nation states and 2) developed a conceptual framework, the organized crime matrix, to explain organized crime as a structure of everyday life across time and space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Originating in the early 1970s, the concept of moral panic has been used to describe the public's reaction to a real or perceived threat. Moral panic has been linked to well-known social problems, including muggings, drugs, juvenile 'delinquency, gangs, and terrorism. More recently, researchers have examined school shootings in this context. Notably absent, however, is a quantitative application of Goode and Ben-Yehuda's (1994a, 1994b) attributional model of moral panic. The present study examines the five key attributes of moral panic-concern, hostility, consensus, disproportionality, and volatility - as they relate to school shootings and fear of crime among college students. The results indicate that respondents' fear of crime is the best predictor of students' subscription to moral panic. Directions for future research, as well as limitations of the present study, also are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fraud is one of the most costly crimes to society. There have been a number of studies documenting the low priority and resources allocated to fraud, but there has been little attempt to conceptualise the processes which lead to this. This paper develops a concept that is the antithesis to deviancy amplification, deviancy attenuation, to examine why the level of resources and interest in fraud are not commensurate with the size of the problem. The paper also develops two further reverse concepts to further explain attenuation: de-labelling and immoral phlegmatism. Empirical evidence is offered in the form of case studies, statistical and survey data to support the arguments presented. The paper also illustrates these arguments through the comparison of the response to benefits fraud in the United Kingdom, which can be considered the one exception amongst frauds where labelling, moral panics and deviancy amplification occurs; explained by some Marxist commentators as a consequence of it being a lower class crime actively pursued by the powerful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A moral panic has broken out in several countries after recent studies showed that girls were outperforming boys in education. Commissioned by the Dutch Ministry of Education, the present study examines the position of boys and girls in Dutch primary education and in the first phase of secondary education over the past ten to fifteen years. On the basis of several national and international large-scale databases, the authors examined whether one can indeed speak of a gender gap, at the expense of boys. Three domains were investigated, namely cognitive competencies, non-cognitive competencies, and school career features. The results as expressed in effect sizes show that there are hardly any differences with regard to language and mathematics proficiency. However, the position of boys in terms of educational level and attitudes and behaviour is much more unfavourable than that of girls. Girls, on the other hand, score more unfavourably with regard to sector and subject choice. While the present situation in general does not differ very much from that of a decade ago, it is difficult to predict in what way the balances might shift in the years to come. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is consensus that since the 1990s, we have experienced a spike in public concern over sexual offenders. Analyzing this concern as a moral panic, this paper argues that national television coverage, as it picks up local news, adds heat to the fire by re-naming the villain as an inadequate judicial system. This process helps to sustain a moral panic, while narrowing the available discourse about the nature of appropriate punishment. Drawing upon a well-publicized example of a media event in Vermont, this paper extends the theory of moral panics to add another stage to the process-a stage presented by the advent of cable news programming, the relationship between local and national media, and the explosion of blogs. In order for a panic to sustain over an extended time period, the rhetoric about it must transform. In particular, the claimsmaking about the nature of the problem must evolve. In particular, the panic has evolved from sex offenders as folk devils to an attack on judicial discretion. The development of the outcry over judicial discretion was due, in part, to media distortion of the case. I will thus trace the trajectory of this one case to demonstrate the role of the media in shaping and sustaining the panic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the role of print media in the development of systemwide curriculum change. Consideration is given to the nature and influence of newspapers on public opinion about curriculum change through the examination of the role of the Mercury in one period in the history of Tasmanian curriculum change. The application of Cohen's ( Folk devils and moral panics: The creation of the mods and rockers (3rd ed.), London: Routledge, ) work on moral panics in influencing public opinion is utilized as a theoretical framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critics argue that the G.W. Bush administration deliberately misled the U.S. public about an Iraqi threat after 9/11 but empirical evidence that presidential deception influenced public support for war has been lacking. An examination of presidential rhetoric concerning Iraq in the U.S. media revealed that it changed in tone after 9/11, consistent with moral panic processes. Logistic regression analysis of public opinion leading up to the war revealed that shifts in support for invasion directly mirrored presidential rhetoric. The findings of this study suggest that the Bush administration engineered a moral panic over Iraq with the support of the media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When there is a period devoid of sensationalistic biker news, the public's concern about outlaw bikers can be quite low. All it takes is one overt act of violence to heighten the public's fear of Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs. Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs are the most current 'dangerous class' which have been the subject of a moral panic in Canada. Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs as organized crime bodies are deemed to be the single most serious threat to the country-the enemy within. The gang war in British Columbia is fuelled by drugs supplied by the Hells Angels and there is a wide spread fear that these evildoers are trying to harm and tear apart the fabric of our society. This article provides a critical in-depth analysis of the construction of an Outlaw Motorcycle Gang moral panic with the focus on Canada. The roles played by the media, politicians, and the public in using isolated, violent incidents to support their interests will be examined along with the interactions between these groups and the resultant punitive actions directed toward members of Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the British state's desire to liquidate the Pit Bull as a breed. It examines the moral panic that brought the Pit Bull Terrier to public attention and traces the government's knee-jerk response that resulted in the Dangerous Dogs Act (), the legal instrument that mandated Britain's first attempt at canine genocide. Though public protection was the stated justification of this exercise in state violence, there was and is no evidence to support the case for canine killing through the indiscriminate blanket medium of breed specific legislation. Far from conceiving the dog an aggressor and humans its victims, this paper precedes on the assumption that the dogs are the victims and humans the inhuman aggressor. The paper concludes by examining the factors that provoked the UK's descent into mass dog killing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the official response to graffiti writing in New York City throughout the 1990s and into the 21st century. Drawing from a variety of documents, such as newspaper articles, political press releases, internal memos and government reports, I show that the city’s reaction to graffiti constitutes a moral panic and that the significance of this response can be discerned when interpreted in the context of theoretical insights developed by urban sociologists. On this basis, I argue that moral panics, or at least a sub-set of panics, may be central to negotiating the social conflict that accompanies the ways in which (urban) space will be put to use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social and institutional alarm around crime and violence within South-Asian communities in the UK has grown substantially over the last 10 years. Whether based on imagined threats and moral panics or on realistic observation of facts, such alarm focuses on drug use, related property crime, gang violence, and ultimately on new forms of organised criminality emerging among Pakistanis, Indians or Sri Lankans. This paper sets the scene by examining this imaginary or realistic alarm, to then offer an overview of studies around South Asian drug use and crime. Subsequently, it presents a number of organised crime models which have taken shape within the communities under examination. Finally, it looks at more recent developments, namely at the changes in organised drug supply determined by specific law enforcement choices and by the general political climate in which such choices are made. The case discussed in this paper shows how the features of illicit markets and the characteristics of the criminal enterprises operating in them may be the unintended consequences of specific social and institutional responses to social problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In western liberal countries late modernity brings in its wake certain distinctive patterns of crime control. Common sense, experience and stigmatization of crime and deviance seem to be the basis on which crime control policies are debated and eventually implemented. Insecurity and fear of crime are the enemies for an effective legal system. What is left for specialist crime control agencies? The Italian case can demonstrate that legal actors, in particular prosecutors, can still effectively participate in the developing of the criminal justice discourse. I will argue that prosecutorial practice can possibly provide the information to understand the socio-legal conditions that shape prosecutors’ role during the pre-trial phase. This role is far from being merely reactive to certain social, historical and cultural developments. Prosecutors’ reactions appear to be aimed at restating their role of guardians of the law. While they react to external influences they try not to adapt to them. In this way they partially mediate the impact of moral panics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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This essay assesses T u Weiming’s notion of transcendence in terms both of its legitimacy as an interpretation of Confucianism and of its viability as an answer to modern challenges. An examination of Tu’s hermeneutical assumptions in his Zhongyong commentary leads to a discussion of his locating transcendence in the subjectivity of the junzi, the profound person. Calling the self-cultivation “self-knowledge,” Tu makes explicit the religious character of the xin, the basis of self-cultivation, and its transcendent character, because it is endowed from heaven. However, because the xin is irreducibly human, this transcendence is also immanentized. From the xin a fiduciary community is formed, hence the “covenantal” nature of Confucian religiousness. The essay ends with the question: Because Tu does not elaborate on cultivating a community’s intersubjectivity, does it make the realization of the transcendent xin a “deferred potentiality,” without mooring in the actual formation of human community? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Campus-based urban legends have the potential to convey and construct student culture in higher education. Basic qualitative and humanistic research methods were used to collect, analyze, and interpret legends related to the academic experience of collegiate life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last twenty years scientific, medical, and public health interest in obesity has skyrocketed. Increasingly the term “epidemic” is being used in the media, medical journals, and public health policy literature to describe the current prevalence of fatness in the U.S. Using social scientific literature on epidemics, social problems, and feminist theories of the body, this paper traces the historical emergence of the “obesity epidemic” through an analysis of 751 articles on obesity published in The New York Times between 1990 and 2001. Through the identification and analysis of three discursive pairings I argue that the “obesity epidemic” is a part of a new breed of what I call “post-modern epidemics,” epidemics in which unevenly medicalized phenomena lacking a clear pathological basis get cast in the language and moral panic of “traditional” epidemics. I show how this moral panic together with the location of the problem within the individual precludes a more macro level approach to health and health care delivery at a time when health care services are being dismantled or severely cut back. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the emotional dynamics of local sex panics over sex education. It argues that local sex panics are not spontaneous eruptions of community outrage; they are political events with a strikingly scripted quality. Sex panics are fueled by emotional scripts—rhetoric strategically crafted to produce volatile emotional responses. In turn, these emotional scripts produce heated emotions—anger and disgust—displayed in ritualized ways in public arenas. In local sex panics we see that emotions are neither irrational nor simply spontaneous; rather they are norm-bound behavior and often meaningful forms of social and political communication produced in response to emotional scripts. The emotions of sex panics represent a means by which moral entrepreneurs attempt to reinforce conservative sexual morality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectification theory (Fredrickson & Roberts, ) contends that media that places women’s bodies and appearance at a premium can acculturate women to self-objectify (i.e., to view the self primarily in terms of externally perceivable attributes), or to feel anxious or ashamed of their bodies. However, another unexplored possibility is that antecedent levels of self-objectification, appearance anxiety, and body shame could drive the selection or avoidance of sexually objectifying media. The goals of the present study were two-fold: first, to test the directionality of the associations between exposure to sexually objectifying media and body self-perceptions (i.e., does exposure to sexually objectifying media predict body self-perceptions or vice versa); and second, to explore the possible moderating influence of thin-ideal internalization, global self-esteem, and BMI on the relations between exposure to sexually objectifying media and body self-perceptions. A 2-year panel study of female undergraduates was conducted. The results show that Time-1 trait self-objectification, appearance anxiety, and body shame all negatively predicted Time-2 exposure to sexually objectifying media. Moreover, Time-1 exposure to sexually objectifying media predicted an increase in Time-2 trait self-objectification, particularly among women who were low in global self-esteem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Misdemeanor crimes said to involve moral turpitude sometimes involve theft or misrepresentation, but another significant category involves sexual behavior. Severe collateral consequences, including witness impeachability, employment disqualification, denial of naturalization, and even disenfranchisement, are often attached not only to felony criminal convictions but also to misdemeanor turpitude offenses. We argue in this article that categorizing misdemeanor sexual conduct as turpitude is problematic because no rational relationship between most sexual conduct and general honesty exists. Linking sexual conduct and dishonesty in legal discourse, while backed by common-law tradition, serves primarily to reinforce norms of gender and sexuality, further marginalizing people without serving the purposes of turpitude law. We demonstrate and applaud a modern trend toward limiting turpitude consequences to exclude sexual conduct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This contribution revisits our earlier research on immigrant beach selling. Self-reflexively and critically analysing the theoretical as well as ideological underpinnings of earlier research efforts into this phenomenon, this contribution now recognizes how this research, conducted during the 1990s, could be seen as part of the social and political struggle over definitions of the phenomenon itself. More precisely its sub text was concerned with the following dilemma: was there more to be feared from the harm caused by the problem of illegal selling itself or from the dangers of ill considered reactions to this behaviour? Revisiting the original research data sets the contribution at hand attempts to shed light on alternative interpretations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes and analyzes recent attempts to construct moral panic about publicly funded sexuality research in the United States, including pressure to eliminate funding for research on sexual topics with public health relevance. At the same time, the article relates the events to other recent cases in which conservative politicians, policy makers, and advocacy groups have sought to shape the production and dissemination of knowledge about sexuality. I argue that these controversies should be approached simultaneously as moral struggles around sexual norms and as credibility struggles around knowledge production. I examine the difficulties involved in articulating strong defenses of sexual knowledge production in response to such attacks, and I emphasize the limits inherent in the strategy of rallying around the autonomy of science and protesting the intrusion of politics into science. These problems point to important strategic dilemmas for activism and policy work related to sexuality and demand a rethinking of the grounds for public participation in scientific debate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I attempt to pull together sociological and geographical perspectives in the study of music to understand the ways in which pop and rock music are socio-cultural products with political and moral meanings and implications. I examine state engineering of moral panics, focusing on a case study of pop and rock music in post-independence Singapore. Such engineering is aimed at political and ideological ends, in particular, ‘nation’-building outcomes. In engineering moral panics through both discursive and legislative acts, the contours of a moral geography are delineated at various spatial scales. First, at the scale of the national and global, moral geographies are inscribed by the state, with the demarcation of national boundaries as the boundaries within which morality resides and beyond which belong negative decadent forces. Second, at the scale of the local and everyday, moral geographies are constructed in terms of certain nightspots, which are thought to be morally damaging, and to be contained. Third, at the spatial scale of the individual self, the body becomes the site of moral judgement. Through the policing of all these scales, moral geographies contribute to the construction of desired ‘Singaporean’ identities. Inasmuch as geographies are inscribed with moralities, so too music. The ‘new’ ‘western’ sounds of particular historical times, and more especially, the performative aspects of music embodying the sensual and the violent, are imputed with moral meaning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role of the media in the construction of social problems is well documented in the social science literature. In some cases, the process of constructing social problems creates a moral panic. In this paper, we contend that a moral panic occurred in the late 1990s regarding hate crimes because of the disproportionate amount of media attention given to the issue. From this panic grew a movement to enact the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 1999. We quantify Goode and Ben-Yehuda's (1999) indicators of a moral panic by triangulating sample data, official statistics, and editorials/opinion polls. Results suggest that a moral panic over hate crimes occurred in America during 1998 and 1999. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines some of the moral panics around hyperactive children, the construction of Attention Deficit-Hyperactivity Disorder, and the lure of Ritalin in turning kids identified as "at risk" into successful, productive individuals. Through a historicization of the child as a psychiatric subject, we try to demonstrate Ritalin's part in the uneven development of modern trends towards the pathologization of everyday life, a developing continuum between normality and abnormality, and an emphasis on the malleability of children and the importance of environment in their upbringing. We conclude that Ritalin is a part of modernity's project of turning people into individuals--in this case, a kind of US transcendence fantasy--which, along with discourses and institutions, promises to transform young subjects and biocosmetically alter their futures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent shootings at schools around the country have resulted in widespread fear and panic among both students and parents, prompting a myriad of responses to make schools safer. Yet, empirical data suggest that despite the recent shootings, schools remain extremely safe places for children, and school violence is lower today than it was several years ago. The present research focuses on the construction of school shootings as a moral panic, with examinations of the roles played by the media, the public, and politicians in using isolated incidents (albeit heinous offenses) to support their interests. The interactions between these groups and the resultant punitive actions directed toward juveniles are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is argued that recent hysteria about Satanic cults can best be understood as moral panic and urban legend. Data from a wide variety of sources, including the author's own personal experience, are brought forward in support of this thesis. It is then suggested that if we are not to remain at the mercy of the anxieties and distortions that produce this moral panic, we must interpret the legend. The interpretation that is offered is that this most recent outbreak of panic about satanism is specifically about a growing awareness of the ubiquity of intergenera-tional eros. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using criteria from recent work by Goode and Ben Ychuda, this article tests the hypothesis that a moral panic relating to (youth) crime has been going on in the Netherlands since 1990. Most of the criteria are met. There is concern about the problem of crime and a consensus on solutions. There are also indications that public disquiet grew out of proportion compared to trends in crime and victimization, and that the panic erupted fairly suddenly. It is not possible to identify a clearer scapegoat than a diffuse image of "the" criminal. It is unclear what caused this panic. It seems unlikely that the panic started as a reaction to public problems, but nor is it possible to state that elites started it or that it was caused by bureaucratic processes at an intermediate level. Several methodological problems connected with the testing of the criteria are discussed. It is recommended that one criterion be added: that of misdirection of reactions to a social problem. It is also recommended that future research should be comparative, either comparing several minor local panics, or comparing panics or non-panics related to equivalent social problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last decade, there have been many allegations about the prevalence of occult or "Satanic" criminality, which is believed to be involved in many offenses ranging from vandalism to child abuse and serial murder. Some have advocated the creation of specialized police units to combat the supposed threat. On the other hand, most of the alleged evils are very poorly substantiated, and highly questionable statements have been widely circulated. In fact, the current concern about the occult appears to have all the hallmarks of a classic moral panic, where a peripheral issue is suddenly perceived as a major social menace. This paper discusses the limited foundation of truth underlying the present "crime-wave"; and suggests that the panic reflects the moral and political agenda of extremists from the fundamentalist religious Right. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents abstracts of reports and articles on criminal policy and research in Europe, including "The Upturned Stone: Political Scandals and Their Investigation Processes in Twenty Democracies," by A. Barker, "Justice Done and Seen to Be Done" The Institutionalized Relationship Between the Press and the Criminal Justice System in the Netherlands," by C. Brants, and "The Impact of Moral Panic on Professional Behavior in Cases of Child Sexual Abuse: An International Perspective," by S. S. M. Edwards, J. Soetenhorst-de Savornin Lohman.