The khat controversy: dark leisure in a liquid modern world

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis paper examines moral debates surrounding khat-chewing, a favoured pastime woven into the cultural fabric of countries located in the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. The ensuing discussion focuses on the moral perspectives that surround khat use within the Somali diaspora in the United Kingdom. Central to this debate is the moral implications of the British Government’s ban on khat - implemented in June 2014 - and the bitterness it has caused within the diaspora. These opinions are unpacked to highlight the difficulties of imposing rigid universal ethics, in a globalised world, prone to continuous movements of peoples and cultural practices. Here, Bauman’s (1993, 1995, 1998) concept of moral responsibility is applied to provide an understanding of morality - and dark leisure - that navigates a path in-between the deterministic scientific thought imposed by state administrators and the relativist position championed by postmodernists.