Guest lecture by Rafal Smoczynski "When Moral Panic Fades: The Decline of Anti-Eastern European Migrant Hostility in Post-Brexit Britain"

Thepresentation will explore the decline of the anti-Eastern European migrant moral panic in Britain following the Brexit referendum. It asks why a moral panic that had persisted for an unusually long period gradually lost its intensity and public legitimacy. Drawing on qualitative interviews with migrants in northern England and an analysis of mainstream media representations, the presentation examines changes in the ways migrants were affectively framed as a threat to the employment security of the native population. The findings suggest that the decline of the panic was not primarily driven by changes in labour market conditions or by the fulfilment of Brexit’s economic promises. Instead, it followed a reduction in the active reproduction of anti-migrant narratives by mainstream media and political actors. As these institutional mechanisms of amplification weakened, collective outrage became increasingly fragmented and lost its capacity to mobilise public hostility. Anti-immigrant sentiment did not disappear entirely, but became largely confined to low-intensity interpersonal encounters and online interactions. The case therefore highlights the volatility of moral panic and underscores the crucial role of media and political actors not only in generating collective alarm, but also in bringing it to an end.

Date and time: October 6, 15:00. 

Venue: Lauvas Street 4, Isaiah Berlin Auditorium. 

All interested are welcome!

Rafal Smoczynski is a sociologist, Associate Professor at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, and Head of the Department for the Study of Religion. His research interests include social control, political philosophy, sociology of elites, and sociology of religion. His work has been published in Ethnic and Racial Studies, East European Politics and Societies and Cultures, Current Sociology, Theory and Society, among others. He has participated in projects funded by the European Commission, the Research Council of Norway, DAAD, and the National Science Centre (Poland), and has acted also as a visiting professor at universities in Australia, South Korea, Iran, Poland, Japan, and Great Britain.