The concept of moral panic has enjoyed a rich history in sociological literature. Since Stanley Cohen (1972) published his seminal study on the Mods and Rockers, scholars have used the concept of moral panic to identify and explain disproportional and exaggerated societal reactions to perceived threats against the social order posed by some condition, episode, person or group of people. However, recent scholars have sought to revise or problematize Cohen’s initial conceptualization, culminating in calls to ‘rethink’ (McRobbie and Thornton, 1995) and ‘think beyond’ (Hier, 2008) moral panic, as well as to ‘widen the focus’ of moral panic analysis (Critcher, 2008). In response, my thesis seeks to strengthen the conceptual and methodological approach to the concept of moral panic by integrating the meta-theoretical principles of critical realism. Critical realism, I argue, provides both the conceptual clarity and methodological insight necessary to enhance scholarly research on moral panic. In addition, the integration of critical realism allows me to more fully explore the internal dynamics and causal mechanisms involved in the genesis of moral panic. The result is a deeper understanding of the ontological nature of moral panic.

The principal aim of this doctoral thesis is to describe the evolution of juvenile delinquency as a social problem during the post-war period. Through its four empirical studies the thesis advocates an understanding based on a contextual constructionism, which represents a compromise position between the objectivist and constructivist perspectives that dominate the field of social problems. The first study (Chapter 2) comprises an analysis of the development of juvenile delinquency in Sweden after 1975. The study is based on official crime statistics, victim surveys, insurance statistics and surveys of the alcohol and drug habits of young persons. The analyses do not allow for an exact determination of the actual trends in juvenile crime, but the indicators suggest that at worst the number of juveniles offenders has remained more or less stable since the mid 1970s, whilst at best the number has diminished. Chapter 3 describes the trends in juvenile crime in ten European countries during the post-war period. The data comprise reports, articles, statistics and personal information from researchers in the countries analysed. The study concludes that in all the countries examined, juvenile crime increases sharply during the first decades of the post-war period (1950-75). After this point, however, these trends level off in most countries. By means of a content analysis of editorials, Chapter 4 deals with the attention focused on juvenile delinquency in the Swedish daily press during the post-war period (1950-1994). The study shows both qualitative and quantitative changes in the way the press portray juvenile crime. Most importantly, 1986 saw the problem of juvenile violence suddenly becoming the dominant issue. Chapter 5 deals with the development of, and the societal response to, violence in schools (1980-1997). A content analysis of a journal for school employees indicates that responses to problems of violence in school underwent a transformation at the end of the 1980s. A study of police reports shows that reported cases of violence in schools have increased considerably. The explanation for this rise is to be found in a change in the size of the dark figure. Besides the response-sensitive official crime statistics, there is very little to indicate any substantial change in the number of juveniles being subjected to, or subjecting others to violence. Chapter 6 discusses the main finding produced by the thesis – namely that there has been a change in the way society reacts to juveniles who commit criminal offences that cannot be explained by the crime trends. Three alternative explanations are discussed: the media and moral panics, the ”racialisation” of the crime problem and the structural crisis of legitimacy faced by the welfare state.

Sociala medier tar en allt större plats i ungdomars vardag, men hur stor plats tar den egentligen. Vi läser i media om hur allt fler ungdomar utsätts för övergrepp, kränkningar och mobbning via sina sociala medier. Vi vill genom vår studie visa hur några ungdomar själva resonerar kring sin användning av sociala medier. Vi vill även lyfta fram deras tankar kring risker och möjligheter som de själva kan se med sociala medier. Vi har intervjuat sju ungdomar från olika områden i Stockholm i åldrarna 15–19 år. Slutsatsen av studien är att ungdomarna kan se att det finns risker med sociala medier. De ser samtidigt att möjligheterna som finns med sociala medier, som till exempel att det är en snabb kommunikationskanal till deras kompisar både nära och långt bort, och att de även har tillgång till nyheter och information från hela världen, överväger riskerna. / Young people’s experience of social media’s risks and opportunities Social media is taking an ever-bigger place in the everyday life of young people, but how much space does it really take. We read in the media about how young people are being subjected to abuse, insults and bullying through their social media. Through our study, we want to show how some young people themselves argue about their use of social media. We also want to elevate their thoughts on the risks and opportunities they can see with social media. We have interviewed seven young people from different areas of Stockholm between the ages of 15-19 years. The conclusion of the study is that young people can see that there are risks with social media. At the same time, they see that the potential of social media, such as giving them a fast communication channel to their friends, both close and far away, and also having access to news and information from around the world, contemplates the risks.

Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur MMA framställs i svensk nyhetsmedia eftersom det historiskt sätt har varit en väldigt omtalad sport och nyhetsmedier tenderar att framställa den väldigt våldsamt, vilket tidigare forskning visar. Studien applicerar två teoretiska perspektiv för att undersöka detta, gestaltningsteorin och moralpanik. Genom en kvantitativ innehållsanalys kombinerat med gestaltningsanalys analyseras ett urval artiklar i från några av de största nyhetsmedierna i Sverige, Aftonbladet, Expressen och SVT Nyheter samt två MMA inriktade nyhetsmedier, Kimura och MMANytt. Detta görs för att undersöka hur olika sorters nyhetsmedier skildrar MMA och på så vis se skillnader ochlikheter för att skapa en helhetsbild av problemet. Resultatet visar att sporten har växt ochblivit mer legitim de senaste åren jämfört med tidigare studier. Trots detta förmedlas ändåen grad av moralpanik i sättet artiklarna ramar in både sporten och sportens utövare på. / The purpose of this study is to examine how MMA is portrayed in Swedish news mediasince historically speaking there has been a stigma about the sport and news media tends to depict it in a very violent manner, which previous studies also shows. The study appliestwo theoretical perspectives, framing theory and moral panic. Through a quantitativecontent analysis combined with a framing analysis a selection of articles are analyzed from some of the biggest sources of news media in Sweden, Aftonbladet, Expressen and SVT Nyheter as well as two MMA focused ones, Kimura and MMANytt. This is done toexamine how different types of news media depicts MMA and, in that way, see differencesand similarities to create a comprehensive understanding of the problem. The results show that the sport has grown and become more legitimate the last few years when compared to previous studies. Despite this a level of moral panic is being mediated in the way articles frame both the sport and its practitioners.

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Previous research demonstrated the phenomenon of moral panics on “dangerous” games mostly from Western perspectives, regarding media violence and deviant behaviour. With the development of media technology, the term “media panic” has evolved from moral panic, representing the debates and fearful emotion from the public when a new media technology has been created. Digital games as a form of media technology have been developed to be widely played on various platforms in recent decades, which have not only brought concerns to the Western but also to Chinese society. The present study will introduce media panic on digital games in China by analyzing news reports from three Chinese mainstream news media: People’s Daily, Xinhua Daily Telegraph and Wen Wei Po (Shanghai). Content analysis will be adopted as the main method to process the news data (N = 445) which are collected from five periods between 2002 and 2020 (2002-2004, 2007-2009, 2012-2014, 2017-2019, 2020). Different phases and features of the panic will be analyzed through the classical moral panic theories of Cohen, Goode and Ben-Yehuda, and the media panic theory of Drotner. Topics of game addiction, Internet cafes, policies on the game industry, cultural innovation, development of esports will be explored when investigating the changing media attitudes toward digital games in the Chinese context.

Injustice continues to be a highly discussed topic in many scholarly disciplines, including rhetoric and law. Scholars in both fields are exploring how language in legal discourse contributes to systematic inequality, discrimination, and unfairness--racial and nonracial. This rise in scholarly interest correlates with civic concern, as there have been many court cases in the last few decades that have captured public and media attention. One of these cases involved Damien Echols and Jason Baldwin, two teenage boys who were convicted for murdering three 8-year-old boys. Echols and Baldwin were tried during the late 20th-century satanic panic, a well-documented social phenomenon in which many Americans found themselves jailed for crimes they did not commit. In Echols and Baldwin's case, the prosecution leaned on the rhetorical situation of the satanic panic, convicting the teenagers with hardly any physical evidence, few reliable witnesses, and little proof that either defendant knew the victims. Though the case was later overturned, no claims of prosecutorial misconduct were admitted as justification for a retrial. This thesis analyzes the prosecution's closing arguments with a focus on Burkean pentadic ratios. The prosecution successfully convicts the defendants by claiming that Echols and Baldwin killed the boys to satisfy satanic beliefs, which becomes the pentadic element "purpose." Other pentadic elements are always contained within or paired with this purpose, thus emphasizing and prioritizing the larger rhetorical situation, the ongoing satanic panic, to promote a sense of fear in the jury that ultimately leads them to convict. The thesis concludes by suggesting that courts consider the rhetorical situation outside the courtroom as well as within to protect others against similar miscarriages of justice.

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The appeal of moral panic studies, a once very popular sociological subfield, dropped precipitously around the turn of the century due in large part to debates about disproportionality, the notion a panicked group's concern about a perceived threat exceeds that warranted by its objective harmfulness. Classic theorists claim disproportionality is a panic's essential criterion and that it can be demonstrated by comparing a group's concerned reaction to the available facts. Critics argue it is a value-laden, ideologically tainted construct and often claim it cannot be demonstrated because there are no authoritative facts. These debates were and still are fraught with confusion. Perplexingly, both sides assume a shared definition despite clearly assessing the proportionality of different aspects of the relevant reaction. A typology differentiating the potential types of disproportionality either does not exist in the moral panic literature or remains shrouded in obscurity. In this paper, I review the classic theories, their critiques, and a new postmodern moral panic theory. By juxtaposing the different foci of the orthodox and contemporary theories, I derive a much-needed disproportionality typology. I also develop a new framework through which to assess moral panics predicated on this typology. My hope is these developments will stimulate a more sophisticated debate about disproportionality and encourage theorists to refine rather than simply reject classic approaches to the disproportionality problem.

The content of the master these sis case study of counter-terrorism measures in th UK and their impact on human rights. The work detaily monitors the development of the counter-terrorist measureas after the 11th of September attacks in the USA. To uderstand the adoption of the legislative measures are used the optics of moral panic which intensify the fear of another attacks. The work analyzes in detail how the measures developed and what is their impact on human rights. It Appears there is consensus on the political spectrum about the aim of the counter-terrorism laws. In addition there are showed law suits presenting the real life struggle about the human rights. Since the UK was not long ago part of the EU text provides short examples on how i tis in other EU countries