Eating sugary food, drinking alcohol and smoking cigarettes are legal activities. But politicians still use the law to discourage them. They raise their price, prohibit or limit their advertisement, restrict where they can be sold and consumed, and sometimes ban them outright. These politicians thereby violate John Stuart Mill's famous principle that people should be free to do whatever they like, provided they harm no one but themselves. Why? What can justify these paternalistic policies? Killjoys reviews the full range of justifications that have been offered: from the idea that people are too irrational to make sensible decisions to the idea that they are effectively compelled by advertising to harm themselves. The author, Christopher Snowdon, exposes the logical or factual errors that undermine each purported justification. He thus provides a comprehensive critique of the health paternalism that has been adopted by governments around the world.

The subject of advertising is often treated with indifference by economists and disdain by the public. Indeed, from time-to-time, there have been calls to ban advertising. Though there has been no general ban, advertising has been prohibited in some sectors and further regulation in this field is continually being considered. Given the importance of advertising in political discussion and the lack of evidence regarding its role and effectiveness, Ralph Harris and Arthur Seldon published Advertising in a Free Society in the late 1950s. This seminal work provided a dispassionate and serious analysis of the subject. It concluded that advertising played a positive role in communicating information and building brand loyalty. Interestingly, some of the most dishonest forms of promotion came from politicians. Christopher Snowdon has skillfully abridged Harris and Seldon's work whilst adding important modern insights. Perhaps the most important of these is his critique of the claim that advertising coerces people into acting against their best interests. He also finds that the modern economic literature largely supports Harris and Seldon's view that advertising facilitates competition and lowers prices. This new study is an important work for all interested in public policy as well as for those studying marketing in business schools or as part of a professional qualification.

The prohibition of alcohol in the USA was a notorious fiasco.
The War on Drugs has been a deadly failure.
Bans on alternative nicotine products keep people smoking cigarettes.
Attempts to suppress legal highs result in more drugs hitting the market.
Prohibition doesn't work but the world is filled with prohibitionists. Why?
Christopher Snowdon's new history of prohibitions is a panoramic study of how bans begin, who instigates them and why they fail. It is a story of moral panics, vested interests and popular hysteria, driven by people who believe that utopia is only ever one ban away.
Includes: The campaign for alcohol prohibition in the USA
The worldwide ban on opium and the dawn of the War on Drugs
The curious case of the European Union's ban on oral tobacco (snus)
The 1920s crusade to suppress drinking worldwide
The prohibition of Ecstasy and the rise of designer drugs
The enduring appeal of prohibitionist policies today
"The new Ken Burns and Lynn Novick documentary Prohibition is a five-and-a-half-hour missed opportunity to demonstrate why bans on substances are doomed from the start. Fortunately, for those who want to understand the irresistible lure of all types of prohibitions, there is Christopher Snowdon s The Art of Suppression: Pleasure, Panic and Prohibition Since 1800. Although Snowdon s comprehensive history will never reach as many people as the PBS series, The Art of Suppression makes the case that Burns seems to go out of his way to avoid: that prohibition of products that people desire, whether alcohol a century ago or Ecstasy today, is bound to fail miserably.
It is easy now, as Ken Burns has masterfully done, to ridicule the prohibition of alcohol. But Snowdon does the heavy lifting of catching modern-day Carrie Nations in the act. Despite a long history of failure, the public always seems ready to enlist in prohibitionist campaigns, perhaps believing, as Snowdon puts it, that utopia is only ever one ban away. - Jeff Stier, Reason magazine
"In masterfully charting the history of the prohibitionists war on pleasurable substances, in highlighting their endless failures to impose restrictions on the public, in exposing their dodgy use of statistics and evidence bases to disguise moral arguments, and in emphasising the ability of us as individuals to exercise our capacity for self-restraint and personal responsibility, Snowdon does all of us determined to challenge the contemporary prohibitionist movement a great service." - Patrick Hayes, Spiked
When the law cuts off one avenue of pleasure, new sources are invariably found, as Snowdon puts it. If there is any great demand for a certain product, be it food, drink, drugs or sex, then the risks of purveying it are met by colossal rewards. The Art of Suppression is full of great facts its description of opium-addicted Britain before the wars is particularly memorable. But its real impact is its pithy denunciation of the prohibitionist cause. It ends with a modest proposal for a more practical and tolerant approach to drugs of all kinds. In his modesty Snowdon does not hold much hope for implementation. But this book must make that goal more likely." - Tom Miers, author of Democracy and the Fall of the West

Spain, 1493 - Europe's first smoker imprisioned by the Inquisition England, 1604 - Massive tax rise on tobacco in a bid to discourage smoking Canada, 1676 - Smoking is banned in the street United States, 1899 - Anti-smoking campaigners call for the eradication of tobacco Germany, 1944 - Smoking banned on public transport to protect workers from secondhand smoke In this revealing and meticulously researched account of an untold story, Christopher Snowdon traces the fortunes of those who have tried to stamp out tobacco through the ages. Velvet Glove, Iron Fist takes the reader on a journey from 15th century Cuba to 21st century California, via Revolutionary France, Victorian Britain, Prohibition Era America and Nazi Germany. Along the way, the author finds uncanny parallels between today's anti-smoking activists and those of the past. Today, as the same tactics begin to be used against those who enjoy alcohol, chocolate, fast food, gambling and perfume, Velvet Glove, Iron Fist provides a timely reminder that once politicians start regulating private behaviour, they find it very hard to quit.