Media risk campaigning in the UK: from mobile phones to ‘Baby P’

A distinctive risk campaigning by particular British media emerged in the late 1990s through three issues: mobile phones, genetically modified organisms and the campaign to expose sex offenders. Subsequently such campaigning has become normalised and generalised, culminating with the 2008 campaign to attribute blame for the death of the murdered child, ‘Baby P’. Their distinctive evolution and characteristics are considered. Central to their success and subsequent generalisation is the encouragement provided by increasing government responsiveness and accommodation. The BSE crisis created a political orientation to engage with public anxiety that in these cases meant engagement with campaigning media.