Hugo Gorringe

What a Difference a Death Makes: Protest, Policing and the Press at the G20

The casual observer of the controversy over policing at April 2009s G20 summit in London might have been forgiven for imagining that Britains media serves as a bulwark against the abuse of power, fearlessly illuminating and condemning injustice. The publication of video footage and eye-witness accounts to heavy-handed protest policing has certainly raised the profile of this issue and led, concretely, to formal investigation of both individual police officers and to policing strategies more broadly. In this paper we examine the policing of protest, and in particular ‘anti-systemic’ protest, but also examine the role of the newspaper media in the interplay between police and protest. We argue that the media has often fomented and ignored the very ‘abuses’ they are now so eager to condemn. The key difference between coverage of the 2009 G20 summit and past such events, we contend, is the tragic death of an innocent bystander which has shifted the way in which the media has framed events.

‘The Anarchists' World Cup’: Respectable Protest and Media Panics

In 2005 225,000 people marched through Edinburgh enjoining the G8 to ‘Make Poverty History’. The coalitions own assessment of their campaign highlighted the importance of media by focusing on the extent of media coverage. Media outlets, however, have their own agendas. Detailed analysis of newspaper coverage preceding the G8 Summit suggests a disjuncture between campaign objectives and media frames. This paper explores how far newspaper accounts of G8-related protests were ‘framed’ in terms of social movement aims, and how far in terms of anticipated violence. Our findings lead us to caution against an uncritical equation of ‘coverage’ and ‘success’, offering a more nuanced account of the interplay between social movements and media.

Facilitating ineffective protest? : the policing of the 2009 Edinburgh NATO protests

This paper reports on innovations in public order policing during the protests surrounding the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) Parliamentary Assembly in Edinburgh, November 2009. When masked anarchist protesters determined to ‘smash NATO’ gathered on the streets on the first morning of the Assembly, they were initially confronted by three plainclothes police negotiators rather than a line of riot police. In this paper, we draw on empirical data to offer an analysis of these developments and gauge the extent to which they meet the stated intentions of the police to ‘facilitate lawful protest’. Whilst welcoming the shift in attitudes and approach towards political protest, we argue that the accent on facilitation in this operation ultimately appeared neither innovative nor effective in practice and frequently reverted to styles of policing designed to contain protest.

The Embodiment of Caste Oppression, Protest and Change

Caste is often presented as a stable or fixed form of social stratification that conditions the behaviour of its members.This occludes the micro-structural process by which caste is embodied.This article uses empirical work on caste protest to discuss the fluid nature of embodied activity, and the analytical utility of two social constructionist accounts: the tacitly pre-given structures of Bourdieus model are compared to the continuous creation model of Foucault.Whereas the internalized structures of Bourdieus habitus initially appear to make most sense of the embodiment and permanence of caste, we contend that a Foucauldian approach offers better insight into the interactional basis of social structures and identity formation.The article reconsiders both theories in light of these empirical data and concludes that analysing interaction at a local level enables us to better comprehend the emergence of social structural features in a caste context.

‘BANAL VIOLENCE‘? THE EVERYDAY UNDERPINNINGS OF COLLECTIVE VIOLENCE

Outbursts of collective violence are often (understandably) met by expressions of outrage or condemnation. ‘How is it,’ accounts muse, ‘that ordinary people can commit such atrocities?’ This article argues that an exclusive focus on the violent act can contribute little to our understanding. Instead, it seeks to elucidate the routine processes and actions that serve to render violence acceptable (even banal) as a mode of action. Exclusive identities and a powerful rhetoric of honour, pride, and shame persuade people that violence is either desirable or even necessary in a given context. Following Billigs account of banal nationalism, I argue that grasping these mundane day-to-day processes is essential for an understanding of collective violence. The article draws on research amongst caste-based movements in South India to support this argument.

'Pants to poverty'? Making poverty history, Edinburgh 2005

July 2005 saw 225,000 people march through Edinburgh in the citys largest ever demonstration. Their cause was the idealistic injunction to ‘Make Poverty History’ (MPH). This paper presents an analysis of the MPH march, focusing particularly on the interplay between protestors, the police and the media. Drawing on ongoing research, it interrogates the disjunction between projected and actual outcomes, paying particular scrutiny to media speculation about possible violence. It also asks how MPH differed from previous G8 protests and what occurred on the day itself. The paper considers three key aspects: the composition and objectives of the marchers (who was on the march, why they were there and what they did?), the constituency that the protestors were trying to reach, and the media coverage accorded to the campaign. The intent underlying this threefold focus is an attempt to understand the protestors and what motivated them, but also to raise the question of how ‘successful’ they were in communicating their message.

King Mob: Perceptions, Prescriptions and Presumptions About the Policing of England's Riots

As journalists and academics, politicians and other commentators struggled to make sense of the social unrest across England, they reached for theoretical understandings of the crowd that have long since been discredited. The powerful imagery of the madding crowd has always been a popular trope with journalists, but what concerned us was the way in which even sociological commentators echoed such ideas. This paper, therefore, draws on our past research, informal interviews with senior police officers and media accounts to offer an analysis of the riots, how they were policed, and contemporary understandings of crowd behaviour. In so doing we question whether current understandings of collective behaviour, deriving from socio-political expressions of anger or protest, are equipped to make sense of the English riots. Similarly, we ask whether police public order tactics need to change. We conclude that the residual attachment to myths of the madding crowd continues to hamper the search for flexible, graded and legitimate means of managing social unrest.

Taming the Dalit Panthers

Although Dalit orators and slogans threaten (or promise) to ‘turn Tamil Nadu on its head’, the 2006 state elections offer Dalit analysts pause for thought. In compromising its principles and allying with established parties, the Dalit Panther Iyyakkam (Movement), the largest Dalit movement in the state, has come full circle since 1999. In alternately backing the two dominant parties in the state (the DMK and the AIADMK), the DPI appears to be increasingly institutionalised. Excavating the future of Dalit action from past trends and contemporary politics, I suggest that Dalit parties are following an established political repertoire in which a phase of militant activism gives way to ‘politics as normal’. In the face of this analysis the paper asks whether such an approach is sustainable or can carry the majority of Dalits with it. If Dalit politics is a continuation of hegemonic politics, it argues, the liberatory promises of Dalit activism will have been betrayed.

The ‘Scottish’ Approach? The discursive construction of a national police force

In 2005, the location of the G8 summit meeting in Gleneagles, Scotland, brought the contested boundaries of the state and the nation to the fore. Confronted by the prospect of significant public disorder police forces in Scotland routinely flagged up a ‘Scottish approach to policing’. Drawing on research with key police officers and others we explore the processes through which national identities come to be articulated, contested and acted out in the context of one particular institution: the police. We consider the claim that policing of the summit was ‘Scottish’ and assess the implications of this assertion. Whilst the police have been argued to be integral to the constitution and expression of nation-statehood we highlight the dangers in an uncritical acceptance of police philosophies and also point to the banal ways in which national identity is naturalised.

The caste of the nation Untouchability and citizenship in South India

Following the devastating tsunami that ravaged parts of the South Indian coast in December 2004, there were reports of continuing caste discrimination against Indias Scheduled Caste (Dalit) community. The reported absence of common feeling shattered the image of India as an ‘imagined community’. Taking its cue from Aloysius, Nigam and Chatterjee, this article draws on field notes and archival reports to examine the ongoing and contested processes of nation and national identity formation in India. It is argued that the template against which the post-colonial state imagined the Indian ‘nation’ was one that excluded marginalised sections of the population. The article concludes by asking whether India may be seen as a ‘national-state’, and critically analyses the interplay between caste and nation.