The pandemic, moral panic and ‘folk devils’

Dr Mathew Mathews, Senior Research Fellow at the NUS Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy and Head of Social Lab at the Institute of Policy Studies at NUS; and Mr Muhammad Shamil Zainuddin, a Research Associate from the same Institute, discussed the issue of moral panic, a condition where certain groups are demonised as “folk devils’, or a threat to societal values and interests, and how this can spread in times of crisis, like the COVID-19 pandemic.

• The Straits Times, 8 May 2020, Opinion, pA15