Theorising Alcohol in Public Discourse: Moral Panics or Moral Regulation?

Abstract

In recent years, politicians, police chiefs, journalists and medical professionals have been vocal in their condemnation of excessive alcohol consumption. Newspapers routinely refer to a “binge-drinking epidemic”, Prime Minister David Cameron has spoken of drink-induced “mayhem on the streets” and Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan-Smith has claimed alcohol is “damaging the fabric of the nation”. Despite the widespread belief that we live in new and difficult times, the 'drink problem' in Britain is nothing new. From the eighteenth century 'gin craze' and the Victorian temperance movement to the more current debates over twenty-four hour licensing and minimum pricing, acute public concern about drinking has been a regular feature of British history. Are these recurrent anxieties the result of successive episodic outbursts of irrational anxiety about different social changes, as classic moral panic theory might postulate? Or can other theoretical frameworks, particularly moral regulation theory, improve our understanding of the British relationship with alcohol?Various academics have examined the connection of alcohol consumption to social anxiety or moralisation. This paper brings fresh insights in two main ways: firstly by focusing on British history, a neglected area in the sociology of drinking; and secondly, by bringing enquiries up to date with an examination of recent public discourse on drink, which has been largely preoccupied with the idea of alcohol as a health problem. Drawing on the work Alan Hunt and Chas Critcher, this paper uses the history of British concerns about drinking to shed new light on the question of whether moral panic theory is still relevant, and, if so, in what form.