Cycles of deviance: Structural change, moral boundaries, and drug use, 1880–1990

Abstract

This article offers a general explanation for changes in rates of deviant behavior. The rate of drug use in the United States between 1880 and 1990 is used as support for the general argument. Rates of use and social attitudes toward users are understood as functions of social mobility. Evidence is offered that supports the explanation that changing moral definitions and rates of behavior depend on demographic and economic changes in American society. The two American drug epidemics witnessed since 1880 occurred when structural change expanded pluralism. Contrary to common knowledge, moral panics were waged not during these epidemics but after they began to subside. Indeed, the rates of deviance as a socially constructed definition vary inversely with the objective number of persons engaging in the particular behavior.