THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF SATANISM - UNDERSTANDING AN INTERNATIONAL SOCIAL-PROBLEM

The 'satanism scare' is a significant collective phenomenon which star ted gaining attention a decade or so ago in America, but has now sprea d to a number of Western countries. This article adopts a social const ructionist perspective to analyse various structural factors and movem ents which have come together to give rise to the satanism scare as an international social problem. Special attention is paid to efforts of American anti-satanist 'missionaries' in the spread of the satanism s care to other countries, including Australia and New Zealand. A new ty pology of types of 'objectivists' - people who to varying degrees acce pt and promote the reality of Satan and satanism - is used as an analy tic device in the presentation.