The term ‘culture of fear’ has grown since around 1970. The culture of fear is what society has grown into; it is a fear of many aspects in life which has been brought on by changes throughout time. These changes have led to a change in interactions between people due to anxieties surrounding society. Frank Furedi is one sociologist who examined this with his first book on the topic (Culture of Fear) in 1997. By the end of the 19th century, there was also a growing risk society brewing, which led to further problems. Due to these two factors there has been a growing trend of institutions and authorities getting involved in every aspect of individuals’ lives to attempt to keep them ‘safe’. This essay will cover what the culture of fear is and how it has developed. It will then go on to talk about the risk society and what this has done to society. Finally, it will look at how (via the culture of fear and risk society) there has been a criminalisation and increase in policing and regulation on various areas of public and private life, while looking at child safety.
The word fear has grown in use and has become attached to many aspects of life – fear of crime, fear of risk and fear of health. Previously when we feared something it was because we had experienced something negative relating to it, however today that is not the case. As Furedi states “individual fears are cultivated through the media and less and less the outcome of direct experience” (Furedi, 2007, p. 3). Furedi’s book looks at why society has become so obsessive with concerns about safety and the growth of fears (Furedi, 2002). The rise in fear is due to the changing ways in society and the lack of community and the rational individual, which later saw the state get involved in many aspects of people’s lives. With the New Labour we seen the number of regulations in our life increasing and that people mostly accepted this. The increase in criminalising and regulating areas of life is anything from being a good thing in certain situations such as parenting, however, it can be argued that politicians and local authorities are mirroring the way society itself has become, covering our own backs. If something happened and nothing was previously in place to stop it, then there would be a question of ‘why wasn’t something done sooner?’.
Bauman’s shows what culture has become. He speaks of ‘liquid modernity’, this is that “none of the consecutive forms of social life is able to maintain its shape for long” (Bauman, 2013, p. 11). This can be seen with the culture of fear with more fears being created and new legislations being introduced to tackle them alongside other areas of life being criminalised due to changing beliefs around issues.
An area which got hit by the culture of crime and fear is that of the community and the individual. Due to fear, people are retreating to their ‘safe space’. Garofalo (1981) states three ways which people try to reduce their chances of becoming a victim: avoidance behaviours, protective behaviours and insurance behaviours (John Howard Society of Alberta, 1999). Avoidance behaviours have a negative impact among people as people become disconnected with each other. This can be seen with neighbours; previously everyone would look out for everyone else and issues would be solved internally. However, due to fear, people are now retreating behind the four walls of their house. This was illustrated by Gilling (1997), who states that this has undermined the informal community controls and from this people are pushed into their homes and become mistrustful of their neighbours. However, this can actually make the problem of crime worse; (Moore and Trojanowicz, 1988), argue that when you retreat behind the walls of your house, you end up making the streets more dangerous as there are then fewer people watching and intervening on the streets. Therefore, the fear of crime (such as antisocial behaviour) has meant an increase in criminalisation. In this respect, with the introduction of Antisocial Behaviour Orders used to help deal with youths who are causing issues. This is something which people would have simply dealt with themselves, but now we have a policing method. With the aspect of not knowing your neighbours now, we are simply left with a question of who can we trust? and because of this question we get an increasing fear which sees us criminalising youths in society, for just mucking around, and because someone can’t stand this it is something which results in young people having to carry something as little as that around with them for the rest of their lives.
Risk is something which has also been a centralising aspect in relation to the culture of fear and the risk society, and which has also led to the criminalisation and regulation of more aspects in society. Furedi (2002, p. 17) states “the term risk refers to the probability of damage, injury, illness, death or other misfortune associated with a hazard”. Durodié looks at risk and he regards risk as being “a product of social progress and the evolution of human consciousness” (Durodié, 2005, p. 2). The increasing use of the term and what is understood from it is interesting. Durodié states that when looking at the loss of social association and the increase in risks, it is a ‘progress of the evolution of consciousness’, which means if do not come together then we are less likely to know what is a real danger and what is not; however since we are all in our own bubble we perceive most things as being a risk. This is confirmed by Durodié (2005, p. 7) as he states, “due to our alienated and distorted perceptions it leads us to identify everything as a risk”. This results in a diminished society, a society who gets the blame for all of this. This is seen by Ugar (2001, p. 227), who states that “a clearly identifiable group or segment of society must be seen as responsible for the threat”; this includes those whose behaviour society sees as causing a risk to us and them, such as smoking, bad drinking habits and drug taking. Using smoking as an example, we all come into contact with smokers and this does second hand damage to us. An example which shows smoking and how we just conform to anything (even if it is not a law) is the ban of smoking on NHS grounds. This is not legally enforceable, however people leave the grounds to smoke, so they are complying with the regulation all in place to keep non-smokers away from risk. Waiton (2010), states that many of the laws in place today are not actually the things which have the most impact on our lives, rather it is in fact the informal regulations which are not actual laws. Waiton describes a great example of how risk has changed regulations and procedures by looking at having a night out; from specifically getting a black cab (since we know they are vetted) to drinking out of plastic cups (introduced in 2006 by the licensing board trying to keep us safe), to then making your way home and not having to talk to any strangers as you have the taxi queue organisers there to sort everything out (Waiton, 2010). This shows how we are all in our own bubble and just conform. Going back to risk itself, Giddens (1994) argues that many of the uncertainties which we now face daily have been created by the growth of human knowledge. Therefore, from the new knowledge processed we end up with new hazards and recognise the risks they pose to us. This has seen the increase use of health and safety regulations to stop us from doing certain things which pose as a risk. Furedi and Bristow (2010, p. 44) state “Health and Safety is often used as a pejorative shorthand for stupid rules that prevent people doing what they should, or want to, do”. This is backed up by Judith Hackitt Head of the Health and Safety Executive who argues that places such as schools are using health and safety to get out of providing certain activities for the fear of getting sued (Batty, 2011). The rise in a risk society (like a culture of fear) has led to the criminalisation and policing of more aspects of life simply because we are coming common to the risks which we may face no matter how big or small they are.
An area which has been impacted is the safety of children. Child safety is a way for the state to get involved in private life, this can be seen with the smacking ban and The Named Person. The way the criminalising dynamic comes into this is through the culture of fear and risk is the way adults are losing connections with children and through children not having any contact with adults outside the school environment. Adults today (through the fear of being accused of kidnapping, abuse or paedophilia) makes adults think twice about what they are doing in case something comes across in the wrong way; suspicion is on everyone’s mind. This can have a negative effect for both adults and children, this is shown with the death of Abby Rae a 2-year-old who escaped from nursery and later died. A man saw her; however, he told an inquiry that he did not turn back to help her in case someone thought he was trying to abduct her (Britten, 2006). Therefore, through the image of the culture of fear it has resulted in people not taking actions in case they look to be a criminal. This suspicion of people leads to criminalisation to keep people safe from their fears and peers. Looking at the proposed smacking ban in Scotland, the culture of fear and risk has seen this ban being established due to the nature of abuse that may go on in homes and mental damage it may cause. However, this is simply going to criminalise parents for tapping their child on the hand (BBC, 2017). It has reached a point where something which used to be the norm has now become a major issue in society which the state deems it necessary to be banned. This not only criminalises parents, it is also the policing of private relationships.
From this we can look at The Children and Youth People (Scotland) Act 2014, better known as the Named Person. This looks to manage the risks and well-being of children by putting services in place to help look out for the child and make sure the child is safe (from their parents). The aim is to support both children and families by getting agencies to work together to improve services and safeguard children (Waiton, 2016). This is getting outside institutions involved in private life just to make sure the child is safe. This results in parenting becoming professionalized. The Scottish government have created 308 well-being indicators which are used as a risk framework, indicators include ‘does the child smile enough?’ and parents have a job to make sure they are hitting targets, so the child’s well-being is good. Waiton (2016) argues that through this approach what we are simply doing is taking the practice of self-guarding to a whole new level and risk management becomes central to parenting. This shows how from a risk society we have more regulations and procedures seeping into private life all in the name of ‘safety’, with outside institutions watching our home life. Furedi (2002, p. 69) states “The family home is no longer portrayed as a refuge, but as a jungle where children are at risk of abuse”. This shows the criminalising/proceduralization dynamic which relates to the culture of fear and risk as even private lives are becoming extremely proceduralized and parents are looked upon as being a risk to their child’s well-being.
In conclusion, the culture of fear and aspects of a growing risk in society has had a major impact on how society now operates. Seen through the fear of not wanting to be harmed by anything or anyone; increase in regulations and aspects of life being criminalised, just to try and keep us safe. However, this is anything from positive, as it reduces our freedom in society and make us trust less people. Even aspects of parenting now are procedurized and parents being watched like a hawk, something which the culture of fear has created. We have moved from a time when we could trust our neighbours to now, we don’t know if they are a threat to us or our children. Many examples have been shown to illustrate how the culture of fear has had a dynamic of criminalising to society, from smacking bans to smoking bans, to how a night out has become extremely regulated and policed. Therefore, through the culture of fear it seems more things are going to be criminalised, such as speech. Society needs open its eyes to what is happening as we seem to be conforming to what is happening.