Assessing a moral panic relating to crime and drugs policy in the Netherlands: Towards a testable theory |
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Authors: | Chris Baerveldt Hans Bunkers Micha De Winter Jan Kooistra |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Social Sciences, University of Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands |
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Abstract: | Using criteria from recent work by Goode and Ben Yehuda, this article tests the hypothesis that a moral panic relating to
(youth) crime has been going on in the Netherlands since 1990. Most of the criteria are met. There is concern about the problem
of crime and a consensus on solutions. There are also indications that public disquiet grew out of proportion compared to
trends in crime and victimization, and that the panic erupted fairly suddenly. It is not possible to identify a clearer scapegoat
than a diffuse image of “the” criminal. It is unclear what caused this panic. It seems unlikely that the panic started as
a reaction to public problems, but nor is it possible to state that elites started it or that it was caused by bureaucratic
processes at an intermediate level. Several methodological problems connected with the testing of the criteria are discussed.
It is recommended that one criterion be added: that of misdirection of reactions to a social problem. It is also recommended
that future research should be comparative, either comparing several minor local panics, or comparing panics or non-panics
related to equivalent social problems.
This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date. |
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