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Rituals of Intoxication: Young People, Drugs, Risk and Leisure

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The New Politics of Leisure and Pleasure

Abstract

This chapter works within the theoretical framework developed by Stan Cohen (1972) to describe youth intoxication as a moral panic but my focus is not on negative representations. I shall examine how young people’s intoxication makes for an effective strategy of regulation by government and the media through the promotion of representations of youth ‘out of control’. This strategy captures a disturbing voyeurism that is both attractive and threatening, and one that supports prohibition policies (Royal Society of Arts, 2007). Government and youth are brought together through different positions focused on risk. Prohibition policies seek to define youth intoxication as pathological whereas young people understand their participation in risk as leisure.

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  1. Shane Blackman
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© 2011 Shane Blackman

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Blackman, S. (2011). Rituals of Intoxication: Young People, Drugs, Risk and Leisure. In: Bramham, P., Wagg, S. (eds) The New Politics of Leisure and Pleasure. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230299979_7

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