ABSTRACT
In 1971, Jock Young announced the arrival of moral panics over drugs and drug use. Stanley Cohen (1972) promoted the concept when young men fought on winter beaches. This chapter explores the historical trajectory of moral regulation projects by comparing the characteristics of the forms of moral regulation that were active at the end of the nineteenth century with those found at the beginning of the twenty-first century. At the outset, it might be helpful to state my view on the relationship between moral regulation and moral panic. I treat moral panics as more- or less-intense variants of projects of moral regulation that are generally of short duration. In contrast, moral regulation projects not only may persist over longer periods, but then also tend to recede only to re-emerge at some later point, often in slightly changed form.
