Purpose – In history, alcohol has most commonly been constructed as a problem that affects individuals, not others. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of historical and contemporary research on alcohol's harms to others and aims to give a rationale for the current increasing interest in this field of research. Design/methodology/approach – This paper reviews the recent literature published on alcohol's harm to others and contextualises this through a discussion of historical and present-day cultural positions on alcohol. Findings – Alcohol was rarely linked to harms to others until the early Temperance movement, but this waned in the early twentieth century. Increasing prosperity post the Second World War led to the relaxation of licensing laws, which coincided with an increasing focus on individualism and consumer capitalism. New public health research identified lifestyle factors, including drinking, as problems that were controllable through health promotion and individual behaviour ch...