Getting Away with Murder? A Social and Cultural History of Drunk Driving

描述(由申请人提供)： 这个项目是酒后驾车的第一个社会和文化史，其主要目标是了解控制这一可能是美国最严重的公共卫生问题的策略的有限成功。尽管经过了几十年的努力，特别是自1980年成立了反对酒后驾车的母亲组织以来，可以说，酒后驾车的人仍然“逍遥法外”。 这项研究的具体目的是： 记录过去一个世纪的酒后驾车问题。 将打击酒后驾车的努力放在他们的社会和文化背景下。 探索对酒后驾车者，包括累犯的处罚往往宽松。 研究社会如何在保护公众健康和饮酒者权利之间取得平衡。 利用有关历史障碍的知识，帮助制定更有效和一致的反酒后驾驶策略。 将采用历史研究中的标准方法，首先全面审查相关的二级文献，在这种情况下，酒精中毒的历史和美国的其他公共卫生措施。这项已经在进行中的审查，使私人侦探能够找出文献中的空白，并构建一个研究假设。接下来，他将在大量档案遗址进行初步研究。这些主要来源--包括未公布的文件、会议记录和通信--将提供有关过去和正在进行的反酒后驾驶努力的成功和失败的关键信息。然后，这些发现将被撰写成一系列学术文章和一本面向学术和普通读者的书，讲述降低酒后驾车死亡率的历史障碍。 该项目具有巨大的公共卫生相关性。尽管采取了积极的措施控制酒后驾车，特别是自1980年以来，每年仍有超过1.5万美国人死于酒后驾车。尽管确定了大量可以进一步降低死亡率和发病率的经过验证的战略，但这些死亡--甚至更多的伤害--仍在发生。通过确定更广泛地实施这些方法的历史障碍，这项研究将对关注加强反酒驾努力的活动家、政策制定者和立法者有利。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The primary objective of this project, the first social and cultural history of drunk driving, is to understand the limited success of strategies to control what may be the most severe public health problem in the United States. Despite decades of efforts, particularly since the founding of Mothers Against Drunk Driving in 1980, drunk drivers, it can be argued, still "get away with murder." The specific aims of this research are: To document the problem of drunk driving over the past century. To place anti-drunk driving efforts in their social and cultural context. To explore the often lax penalties issued to drunk drivers, including recidivists. To study how society balances the protection of the public's health with drinkers' rights. To use knowledge about historical barriers to help craft more effective and consistent anti-drunk driving strategies. Standard methods in historical research will be employed, beginning with a comprehensive review of the relevant secondary literature, in this case the history of alcoholism and other public health measures in the United States. This review, already underway, has allowed the P.I. to identify gaps in the literature and construct a research hypothesis. He will next perform primary research at a large number of archival sites. These primary sources-including unpublished documents, minutes of meetings and correspondence-will provide crucial information about the successes and failures of past and ongoing anti-drunk driving efforts. The findings will then be crafted into a series of scholarly articles and a book for academic and lay audiences on the historical barriers to efforts to lower the death rate from drunk driving. This project has enormous public health relevance. Despite aggressive efforts to control drunk driving, particularly since 1980, over 15,000 Americans are still killed annually by drunk drivers. These deaths-and even more injuries-occur despite the identification of a large number of proven strategies that could further lower mortality and morbidity. By identifying the historical barriers to more widespread implementation of these approaches, this research will be of benefit to activists, policymakers and legislators concerned with enhancing anti-drunk driving efforts.