Bibliography: Moral Panics

Below is a significant body of works surrounding the sociological concept of moral panics. There is a wide array of books and papers which cover various examples of moral panics, definitions of moral panics, and the various types of moral panic.

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Books

Cohen, S. (2011). Folk devils and moral panics: the creation of the Mods and Rockers. Routledge classics. Abingdon, Oxon New York: Routledge.

Cooke, A. C. (2017). Moral panics, mental illness stigma, and the deinstitutionalization movement in American popular culture. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

Cossins, A. (2015). Female Criminality: Infanticide, Moral Panics and The Female Body. Springer.

Cree, V. E., Clapton, G. & Smith, M. (2015). Revisiting moral panics. Bristol, UK; Chicago, Il, Usa: Policy Press.

Critcher, C. (2013). Moral panics in the contemporary world. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

Fahs, B., Dudy, M. & Stage, S. (2013). The moral panics of sexuality. Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan.

Hauptman, S. (2013). The criminalization of immigration: the post 9/11 moral panic. El Paso: Lfb Scholarly Publishing Llc.

Herdt, G. (2009). Moral Panics, Sex Panics. NYU Press.

Krinsky, C. (2013). The Ashgate research companion to moral panics. Farnham, Surrey; Burlington, Vt: Ashgate.

Laycock, J. (2015). Dangerous games: what the moral panic over role-playing games says about play, religion, and imagined worlds. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Lemmings, D. & Walker, C. (2009). Moral panics, the media and the law in early modern England. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire; New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Patry, W. F. (2009). Moral panics and the copyright wars. Oxford; Toronto: Oxford University Press.

Rodwell, G. (2017). Moral Panics and School Educational Policy. Taylor & Francis.

Springhall, J. (1999). Youth, Popular Culture and Moral Panics. Bloomsbury Publishing.

Thiel-Stern, S. (2014). From the dance hall to facebook: teen girls, mass media, and moral panic in the United States, 1905-2010. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press.

Thompson, K. (1998). Moral panics. London New York: Routledge.

Papers

Aitken, S. C. (2001). Schoolyard shootings: Racism, sexism, and moral panics over teen violence. Antipode, 33(4), 593–600. Wiley Online Library.

Ajzenstadt, M. (2009). Moral panic and neo-liberalism: The case of single mothers on welfare in Israel. The British Journal of Criminology, 49(1), 68–87. Oxford University Press.

Alvi, S. (2018). Marrying digital and analog with generation Z: Confronting the moral panic of digital learning in late modern society. Transforming our World Through Design, Diversity and Education (pp. 444–453). IOS Press.

Anitha, S. & Gill, A. K. (2015). A moral panic? The problematization of forced marriage in British newspapers. Violence against women, 21(9), 1123–1144. SAGE Publications Sage CA: Los Angeles, CA.

Anušić, N. & Kovačić, V. (2021). The Impact of Moral Panic on Morbidity of Sexually Transmitted Diseases in SR Croatia at the Beginning of the HIV/AIDS Pandemic. Radovi Zavoda za hrvatsku povijest Filozofskoga fakulteta Sveučilišta u Zagrebu: Radovi Zavoda za hrvatsku povijest Filozofskoga fakulteta Sveučilišta u Zagrebu, 53(1), 267–304.

Bakken, B. (2004). Moral panics, crime rates and harsh punishment in China. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 37(1_suppl), 67–89. SAGE Publications Sage UK: London, England.

Barron, C. & Lacombe, D. (2005). Moral panic and the nasty girl. Canadian Review of Sociology/Revue canadienne de sociologie, 42(1), 51–69. Wiley Online Library.

Baumgaertner, R., Colvin, E. & Birch, P. (2018). Moral panic and perceptions of community fear: A local community study examining drug use. Salus Journal, 6(2), 21–36.

Ben-Yehuda, N. (1986). The Sociology of Moral Panics: Toward a New Synthesis. The Sociological Quarterly, [online] 27(4), pp.495–513.

Biltereyst, D. (2004). Media audiences and the game of controversy. On reality TV, moral panic and controversial media stories. Journal of Media Practice, 5(1), 7–24. Taylor & Francis.

Bodziany, M. & Kocoń, P. (2018). Ivan at the gates! – Armed conflict in Ukraine and the moral panic in Poland? TRAMES: A Journal of the Humanities & Social Sciences, 22(2).

Bogen, R. & Marlowe, J. (2017). Asylum discourse in New Zealand: Moral panic and a culture of indifference. Australian Social Work, 70(1), 104–115. Taylor & Francis.

Bonn, S. A. (2011). How an elite-engineered moral panic led to the US war on Iraq. Critical Criminology, 19, 227–249. Springer.

Brennan, D. (2017). Fighting human trafficking today: Moral panics, zombie data, and the seduction of rescue. Wake Forest L. Rev., 52, 477. HeinOnline.

Colomb, W. & Damphousse, K. (2004). Examination of newspaper coverage of hate crimes: A moral panic perspective. American Journal of Criminal Justice: AJCJ, 28(2), 147. Springer Nature BV.

Cree, V. E., Clapton, G. & Smith, M. (2012). The presentation of child trafficking in the UK: An old and new moral panic? British journal of social work, bcs120. BASW.

Critcher, C. (2008). Moral Panic Analysis: Past, Present and Future. Sociology Compass, 2(4), 1127–1144. Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Critcher, C. (2009). Widening the focus: Moral panics as moral regulation. The British Journal of Criminology, 49(1), 17–34. Oxford University Press.

Cromer, G. (2004). “Children From Good Homes” Moral Panics about Middle-Class Delinquency. British Journal of Criminology, 44(3), 391–400. Oxford University Press.

Cyr, J. L. (2003). The folk devil reacts: Gangs and moral panic. Criminal Justice Review, 28(1), 26–46. Sage Publications Sage CA: Thousand Oaks, CA.

Dai, M. (2020). The 1983 strike-hard campaign in China: a moral panic? The British Journal of Criminology, 60(5), 1220–1241. Oxford University Press UK.

Dalby, J. R. (2015). “Such a Mass of Disgusting and Revolting Cases”: Moral Panic and the “Discovery” of Sexual Deviance in Post-Emancipation Jamaica (1835-1855). Slavery & Abolition, 36(1), 136–159. Taylor & Francis.

De Lint, W. & Dalton, D. (2021). Anatomy of Moral Panic: The “List of 88” and Runaway Constructionism. Critical criminology, 29(4), 723–743. Springer.

Dee, E. (2016). The production of squatters as folk devils: Analysis of a moral panic that facilitated the criminalization of squatting in the Netherlands. Deviant Behavior, 37(7), 784–794. Taylor & Francis.

Deflem, M. (2020). Popular culture and social control: The moral panic on music labeling. American Journal of Criminal Justice, 45, 2–24. Springer.

DeYoung, M. (1997). The devil goes to day care: McMartin and the making of a moral panic. Journal of American Culture, 20, 19–26. Bowling Green State Univ.

Dunbar, D. & Swart, S. (2012). “No less a foe than Satan himself”: The Devil, Transition and Moral Panic in White South Africa, 1989-1993. Journal of Southern African Studies, 38(3), 601–621. Taylor & Francis.

Dunbar, D. & Swart, S. (2015). The Devil Rejoiced: Volk, Devils and Moral Panic in White South Africa, 1978-1982. Journal of historical sociology, 28(2), 235–263. Wiley Online Library.

Eades, D. (2019). “Stopping the boats” to save lives? Humanitarian concern as a slow moral panic. Media Practice and Education, 20(1), 87–106. Taylor & Francis.

Ellison, G. (2017). Criminalizing the payment for sex in Northern Ireland: Sketching the contours of a moral panic. British Journal of Criminology, 57(1), 194–214. Oxford University Press UK.

Elsass, H. J., Schildkraut, J., Haenfler, R., Klocke, B. V., Madfis, E. & Muschert, G. W. (2021). Moral Panic, Fear of Crime, and School Shootings: Does Location Matter? Sociological Inquiry, 91(2), 426–454. Wiley Online Library.

Eversman, M. H. & Bird, J. D. (2016). Moral panic and social justice: A guide for analyzing social problems. Social Work, 1–8. Oxford University Press.

Falkof, N. (2010). Apartheid’s demons: Satanism and moral panic in South Africa. HAGAR Studies in Culture, Polity and Identities. Sheva: Ben Gurion University of the Negev Israel, 113–133.

Fejes, F. (2000). Murder, perversion, and moral panic: The 1954 media campaign against Miami’s homosexuals and the discourse of civic betterment. Journal of the History of Sexuality, 9(3), 305–347. JSTOR.

Fitzgerald, I. & Smoczynski, R. (2015). Anti-Polish migrant moral panic in the UK: a response. Sociologicky Casopis, 51(3), 380. Institute of Sociology of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic.

Flinders, M. V.  & Wood, M. (2015). From folk devils to folk heroes: Rethinking the theory of moral panics. Deviant Behavior, 36(8), 640–656. Taylor & Francis.

Flinders, M. V. (2012). The demonisation of politicians: Moral panics, folk devils and MPs’ expenses. Contemporary Politics, 18(1), 1–17. Taylor & Francis.

Gale, F. & Bolzan, N. (2016). Online ghettoes, perils or supernannies? Australian young people with chronic illness and disability challenge some moral panics about young people online. Disability & society, 31(8), 1112–1126. Taylor & Francis.

Goode, E. & Ben-Yehuda, N. (1994). Moral panics: Culture, politics, and social construction. Annual review of sociology, 20(1), 149–171.

Goode, E. (2000). No need to panic? A bumper crop of books on moral panics. Sociological Forum (pp. 543–552).

Goode, E. (2008). Moral panics and disproportionality: The case of LSD use in the sixties. Deviant Behavior, 29(6), 533–543. Taylor & Francis.

Grabe, M. E. & Bucy, E. P. (2022). Moral panics about the integrity of information in democratic systems: Comparing tabloid news to disinformation. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 1–27. Taylor & Francis.

Hall, L. A. (1992). Forbidden by God, despised by men: Masturbation, medical warnings, moral panic, and manhood in Great Britain, 1850-1950. Journal of the History of Sexuality, 2(3), 365–387.

Hannerz, E. & Kimvall, J. (2020). Keeping it clean: Graffiti and the commodification of a moral panic. Visual Inquiry: Learning & Teaching Art, 9(1-2), 79–92. Intellect.

Heilborn, M. L., Brandão, E. R. & Cabral, C. D. S. (2007). Teenage pregnancy and moral panic in Brazil. Culture, Health & Sexuality, 9(4), 403–414.

Hier, S. (2016). Moral panic, moral regulation, and the civilizing process. The British journal of sociology, 67(3), 414–434. Wiley Online Library.

Hier, S. P. & others. (2015). The cultural politics of contemporary moral panic studies: Reflections on a changing research agenda. Sociologick`y časopis/Czech Sociological Review, 51(03), 362–372. Sociologick`y ústav AV ČR, vvi.

Hier, S. P. (2011). Tightening the focus: moral panic, moral regulation and liberal government. The British journal of sociology, 62(3), 523–41.

Horsley, M. (2017). Forget moral panics. Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Criminology, 9(2), 84–98.

Houghton, F. (2022). Keep calm and carry on: moral panic, predatory publishers, peer review, and the emperor’s new clothes. Journal of the Medical Library Association: JMLA, 110(2), 233. Medical Library Association.

Hunt, A. (1997). “Moral Panic” and Moral Language in the Media. The British Journal of Sociology, 48(4), 629.

Huq, R. (2013). Suburbia Runs Riot: The UK August 2011 Riots, Neo-Moral Panic and the End of the English Suburban Dream? Journal for Cultural Research, 17(2), 105–123. Taylor & Francis.

Jenkins, P. (2009). Failure To Launch Why Do Some Social Issues Fail to Detonate Moral Panics? The British Journal of Criminology, 49(1), 35–47. Oxford University Press.

Johnstone, M.-J. (2015). “Moral panics” and asylum seekers. Australian Nursing and Midwifery Journal, 23(3), 19.

Jones, K. (2008). Professional politicians as the subjects of moral panic. Australian Journal of Political Science, 43(2), 243–258. Taylor & Francis.

Katz, K. (2011). The enemy within: The outlaw motorcycle gang moral panic. American Journal of Criminal Justice, 36, 231–249. Springer.

Kiersnowska, B. (2019). Female cycling and the discourse of moral panic in late Victorian Britain. Atlantis, 41(2), 85–104. JSTOR.

Klypchak, B. (2011). “How you gonna see me now”: Recontextualizing metal artists and moral panics. Popular Music History, 6.

Kruttschnitt, C. & Gartner, R. (2008). Female violent offenders: Moral panics or more serious offenders? Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 41(1), 9–35. SAGE Publications Sage UK: London, England.

Lavorgna, A. (2019). Cyber-organised crime. A case of moral panic? Trends in Organized Crime, 22(4), 357–374. Springer.

Lawson, L. (2007). Why Moral Panic is Dangerous. Journal of forensic nursing, 3(2), 57–59. LWW.

Levi, M. (2009). Suite revenge? The shaping of folk devils and moral panics about white-collar crimes. The British Journal of Criminology, 49(1), 48–67. Oxford University Press.

Lombardo, R. M. (2004). The Black Hand: A study in moral panic. Global Crime, 6(3-4), 267–284. Taylor & Francis.

Lynch, C. (2021). Moral panic in the industrial town: teenage “deviancy” and religious crisis in Central Scotland c. 1968-9. Twentieth Century British History, 32(3), 371–391. Oxford University Press.

Maguire, M. & Singer, J. K. (2011). A false sense of security: Moral panic driven sex offender legislation. Critical Criminology, 19, 301–312. Springer.

Markey, P. M. & Ferguson, C. J. (2017). Teaching Us to Fear: The Violent Video Game Moral Panic and The Politics of Game Research. American journal of play, 10(1), 99–115. ERIC.

Mawby, R. C. & Gisby, W. (2009). Crime, media and moral panic in an expanding European Union. The Howard Journal of Criminal Justice, 48(1), 37–51. Wiley Online Library.

McRobbie, A. & Thornton, S. L. (1995). Rethinking “Moral Panic” for Multi-Mediated Social Worlds. The British Journal of Sociology, 46(4), 559.

Miller, P. G. (2007). Media reports of heroin overdose spates: Public health messages, moral panics or risk advertisements? Critical Public Health, 17(2), 113–121. Taylor & Francis.

Miller, T. & Leger, M. C. (2003). A very childish moral panic: Ritalin. Journal of Medical Humanities, 24, 9–33. Springer.

Molland, S. (2019). What happened to sex trafficking? The new moral panic of men, boys and fish in the Mekong region. SOJOURN: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia, 34(2), 397–424. JSTOR.

Morgan, G., Dagistanli, S. & Martin, G. (2010). Global fears, local anxiety: Policing, counterterrorism and moral panic over “bikie gang wars” in New South Wales. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 43(3), 580–599. SAGE Publications Sage UK: London, England.

Niehaus, I. (2010). Maternal incest as moral panic: envisioning futures without fathers in the South African lowveld. Journal of southern African studies, 36(4), 833–49.

O’Riordan, N. (2021). Wild Mountain Thyme and the Moral Panic around the Irish Accent on Film. Estudios Irlandeses-Journal of Irish Studies, (16), 321–326. AEDEI.

Odartey-Wellington, F. (2009). Racial Profiling and Moral Panic: Operation Thread and the Al-Qaeda Sleeper Cell that Never Was. Global Media Journal: Canadian Edition, 2(2).

Osuna, S. (2020). Transnational moral panic: Neoliberalism and the spectre of MS-13. Race & Class, 61(4), 3–28. SAGE Publications Sage UK: London, England.

Pepin-Neff, C. & Cohen, A. (2022). President Trump’s transgender moral panic. The Trump Administration (pp. 219–234). Routledge.

Potter, R. H. & Potter, L. A. (2001). The internet, cyberporn, and sexual exploitation of children: Media moral panics and urban myths for middle-class parents? Sexuality and Culture, 5(3), 31–48. Springer.

Poynting, S., Noble, G. & Tabar, P. (2001). Middle Eastern appearances: “Ethnic gangs”, moral panic and media framing. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 34(1), 67–90. SAGE Publications Sage UK: London, England.

Reed, I. A. (2015). Deep culture in action: resignification, synecdoche, and metanarrative in the moral panic of the Salem Witch Trials. Theory and Society, 44, 65–94. Springer.

Rooney, K. (2001). Moral Panics. Fortnight, (397), 18–18.

Sarwary, H. & Opper, J. (2021). Now is Not the time for parties! The construction of public health, problematic youth and moral panic. Kriminologisches Journal, 53(1), 63–77. Juventa.

Silcox, J. (2022). Youth crime and depictions of youth crime in Canada: Are news depictions purely moral panic? Canadian Review of Sociology/Revue canadienne de sociologie, 59(1), 96–114. Wiley Online Library.

Smoczyński, R. & others. (2016). Mapping new research directions in the sociology of moral panic. Studia Socjologiczne, 222(3), 9–29. Instytut Filozofii i Socjologii Polskiej Akademii Nauk.

Snelson, T. (2012). From Juke Box Boys to Bobby Sox Brigade: Female youth, moral panics and subcultural style in wartime times square. Cultural studies, 26(6), 872–894. Taylor & Francis.

Soothill, K. & Francis, B. (2002). Moral panics and the aftermath: a study of incest. The Journal of Social Welfare & Family Law, 24(1), 1–17. Taylor & Francis.

Springhall, J. (2014). “Guilty pleasures”: moral panics over commercial entertainment since 1830. Historian, (122), 33. The Historical Association.

Sutton, M. (2013). The British Moral Panic Creation Myth is Bust. [online] Dysology. Available at: https://dysology.blogspot.com/2017/12/the-british-moral-panic-creation-myth.html.

Tsaliki, L. (2015). Popular culture and moral panics about “children at risk”: revisiting the sexualisation-of-young-girls debate. Sex Education, 15(5), 500–514. Taylor & Francis.

Ungar, S. (1990). Moral panics, the military-industrial complex, and the arms race. The Sociological Quarterly, 31(2), 165–185.

Victor, J. S. (1998). Moral Panics and the Social Construction of Deviant Behavior: A Theory and Application to the Case of Ritual Child Abuse. Sociological Perspectives, 41(3), 541–565.

Vitiello, M. (2020). The war on drugs: Moral panic and excessive sentences. Clev. St. L. Rev., 69, 441. HeinOnline.

Waddington, P. A. (1986). Mugging as a moral panic: A question of proportion. British Journal of Sociology, 245–259. JSTOR.

Warner, J. (2013). Social work, class politics and risk in the moral panic over Baby P. Health, Risk & Society, 15(3), 217–233. Taylor & Francis.

Waterhouse, R.T. (2014). Satanic abuse, false memories, weird beliefs and moral panics. (Unpublished Doctoral thesis, City University London)

Woodiwiss, M. & Hobbs, D. (2009). Organized evil and the Atlantic alliance: Moral panics and the rhetoric of organized crime policing in America and Britain. The British Journal of Criminology, 49(1), 106–128. Oxford University Press.

Yeo, E. J. (2004). Editorial, the boy is the father of the man: moral panic over working-class youth, 1850 to the present. Labour History Review, 69(2), 129–34.

Young, J. (2009). Moral panic its origins in resistance, ressentiment and the translation of fantasy into reality. The British Journal of Criminology, 49(1), 4–16. Oxford University Press.

Zajdow, G. (2008). Moral panics: The old and the new. Deviant behavior, 29(7), 640–664. Taylor & Francis.

Zgoba, K. M. (2004). Spin doctors and moral crusaders: The moral panic behind child safety legislation. Criminal justice studies, 17(4), 385–404. Taylor & Francis.