Contemporary cultures of abstinence and the nighttime economy: Muslim attitudes towards alcohol and the implications for social cohesion

This paper draws on original empirical work with the British Pakistani community to explore Muslim attitudes to alcohol and alcohol-related practices, before considering how the Pakistani Muslim community's culture of abstention shapes its members' access to, and use of, public space in the nighttime economy. We foreground the active role played by alcohol, as a nonhuman actor, in shaping emergent social relations by exploring its agency in generating new exclusions with the mainstream nighttime economy. By using the lens of a faith-based culture of abstention in this way, this paper provides a new perspective on debates about access to public space and social cohesion in the contemporary urban nighttime economy. © 2010 Pion Ltd and its Licensors.