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© Clive Bloom 2012 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, Saffron House, 6–10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2012 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN 978–1–137–02935–5 This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne

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CONTENTS

List of Figures viii

List of Plates ix

Acknowledgements xii

Permissions xiv

1 2000: Preface to Disorder in the Twenty-First Century 1

2 2010: Occupy Everything 17

3 2010 to 2012: The Constant Threat and the Distant Fear 29

4 2010: The Crisis and the Student Riots 54

5 2011: The Summer Riots – A Cold Wind in August 76

6 1668, 1780 and 1981: Contexts and Explanations 100

Appendix 1 1968: The Revolutionary Model Redefined 127 Appendix 2 Under this Sign Conquer: The Visible Republic of London 146 Appendix 3 A Little Riotous Chronology 159 Notes 163 Index 177

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2000: PREFACE TO DISORDER IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

Since 2000 we have seen unprecedented levels of unrest in London. The capital has become the battleground for a host of new demands and new ideological standpoints, so much so that protesters and authority alike have had to invent new tactics to cope with the pressure of new demands. Once extra-parliamentary protest was relatively rare. There were exceptions, of course, in the Suffragette movement before the First World War, the rallies of fascists and their opponents during the 1930s, the Aldermaston Marches of the 1950s and 1960s, and the CND and anti-Vietnam protests. Each was a response to a specific crisis and each (excluding the Vietnam protests) ultimately recognised parliamentary action as the supreme goal. Nowadays, there is no confidence in Parliament or the perceived chiselling of its members, and the House of Lords seems merely to be a chamber packed with political appointees and technocrats; the police are still seen as the active agents of state repression. Since the millennium there have been growing political move- ments whose focus is no longer on parliamentary decisions, but instead is based upon direst action – the action of committed people disillusioned with the apparent collusion of politicians and fin- anciers. These new political activists have named themselves the spokespeople for the ‘99 per cent’ of the population that they per- ceive have no power and they have vowed to bring to account the one per cent who have it all. This movement, more anarchist-communal

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2 RIOT CITY than Marxist-communist, has grown as perceived inequality has grown in the first ten years of the new century; the banking crisis of 2008 crystallised its demands for a fairer system. It is natural justice that needs re-affirming, say protesters, and not laws that need changing. The old cry that the whole system is corrupt and needs demolishing rises once again; students in 2010 and the poor in 2011 knew why they were there. London is still Babylon, the ‘Great Wen’ of the radical William Cobbett, but in the belly of the beast something rises: a new politics. What is this that is coming? The ghosts of old promises whisper in the atmosphere of new dreams. Lenin, in the midst of Bolshevik triumph, could confidently feel that the fact ‘that the socialist revolution in Europe must come, and will come, is beyond doubt. All our hopes for the final victory of socialism are founded on this certainty’.1 He was incorrect; there are no mathematical certainties in politics, but he was not wholly wrong. International political resistance is stronger than it has been for many years and there are new chal- lenges and new demands, but always the same corrupt system, ever the same authorities barring the way, but ever the same goal, ever the same promise of equality, liberty and justice; always on a distant horizon and always illusory, but always to be striven towards. Protest constantly changes in London, and in recent years much has changed. Not perhaps in quantity or in levels of violence, although violence has increased as much from the authorities as from protesters. What has come to prominence since the May Day and Guerrilla Gardening exploits at the turn of the millennium is a moral agenda defining but outside of the political sphere proper. When voters feel impotent or when protestors are ignored by Parliament, anger and frustration replace political debate with calls for natural justice and rightness – a moral agenda replaces political talk as people spill onto the street. The Iraq War, climate change, fox hunting legislation, the greed of world bankers and their bonuses, and politicians who are seen to be working the system whilst others are laid off infuriate and frustrate the public, who feel ignored by their representatives and who believe that they are treated with contempt by those who seem to be above the law and beyond legal redress. More importantly, the servants of the general public, the police, have increasingly been perceived as the instruments of the rul- ers, so much so that they themselves were forced to address the

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2000: PREFACE TO DISORDER IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY 3 issue of public confidence in a report produced by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary in July 2009 called Adapting to Protest, which followed the G20 and other difficult protests that year.2 The essential message of the report was that the policing of public order events must be lawful, consensual and legal, not provocative and aggressive. The right way to live for protesters has become the right lifestyle to have: not a single-issue argument as in the old days, but a whole package of values, some anarchist, some libertarian, but just as often a rather old-fashioned Trotskyist socialism (usually unar- ticulated) in which anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, anti-airport expansionism and anti-fat-cat-ism mix: a higgledy-piggledy com- position of the positive virtues of environmental concern, support for Palestine and a new world based on citizenship of ‘Planet Earth’. There is no one cause anymore, there are only a plurality of causes. It is this pluralism that will unite groups as disparate as Class War, Anonymous, Greenpeace, UK Uncut and the International Union of Sex Workers. To some extent, it is the old revolt of youth against age, of the powerless against those in power, of radicalism and alternative lifestyle against the innate conservatism of those who rule. For the most part, all the usual suspects will turn up, the same folks who turn up for any anti-authority gig, whatever the actual cause. They number from a few hundred to a mere few thousand hardcore young people and students or those who were young in the days of the squatting movement of the 1970s and 1980s. The new counter culture is small and self-defining, keeping in contact through current media – the Internet, blogs, websites, streaming, texting, Twitter, MSN, BlackBerry – in many respects using communication systems only known to a relative few with media savvy and ironically thereby restricting the number of activists to a small group and effectively creating a virtual ghetto for their ideas, which do not then reach a wider public and are therefore subsequently fre- quently misunderstood. Even the language of protest often sounds like it was borrowed from the enemy’s latest corporate buzzwords. Thus, there is talk of ‘open sourcing’ and ‘working groups’, ‘break out’ sessions and other phrases glibly borrowed from an alien rhetoric to describe a situation of ‘open’ alliances and friendships. Nevertheless, through personal involvement and actual activity in real space and time, revolutionaries may rally many thousands and this may be helped

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4 Coalition of Resistance flyer (courtesy of Coalition of Resistance) Figure 1.1 Figure

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2000: PREFACE TO DISORDER IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY 5 by the simple reporting of newspapers and television as much as by personal electronic equipment. For the most part, the new urban warriors of the twenty-first century began secretively and defensively, breaking the windows of banks or trouncing McDonald’s as acts of petty defiance in the cause of the revolution. In 2010, this timidity changed as Conservative Campaign Headquarters was attacked and children defied police. In 2011, these new militants (mostly students and schoolchildren) were joined by another class, ill educated, hedonistic, raucous and ill pre- pared to do what they traditionally had been instructed to do by their so-called betters. Another class entirely, one left out of the political debate because its members were inarticulate and badly educated, joined the street party: the urban poor were willing to loot shops, burn buildings and fire guns at the police to get their point across. The silent majority may not remain silent for long either. The suburban and rural middle classes are also willing to protest if the issue is one that affects their lifestyle or moral perspective. The combination of conservatism, traditionalism, middle-England values and single-issue ‘moral’ politics is often likely to end up suc- ceeding where other causes fail. The middle classes already have knowledge and power on their side and know how to articulate grievances (remember the ‘Poll Tax’ protests of 1990), especially when such grievances contain values which are ignored or ridi- culed by the intellectual elite, Parliament and ‘hippy do gooders’. Yet, since 2000, they too have been defeated time and again by those in power. Real political power now seems beyond not only the impoverished underclasses but also the middle classes, whose votes seem to evaporate as government is formed. In 1832, the middle classes won the franchise which promised political power and a say in the running of the nation. Changes to the franchise promised real democracy. The Labour Party arose to defend worker’s rights. New Labour, with its ‘authoritarian’ political viewpoint, seemed to reverse a process which had lasted over 160 years. The banking crisis put a complete stop to ‘democratic’ opportunities. The people no longer had to be consulted; tech- nocratic government would see to that. Between 2001 (the start of New Labour’s second term) and 2012, the middle classes, who make up the backbone of the politically engaged, seemed further from power than ever. Nowhere was this more evident than in the history of their recent protests.

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6 RIOT CITY The emergence of the Countryside Alliance in the opening years of the new century, which came together around a combination of issues that were understood by supporters to have been ignored by the metropolitan elite, was cause for thought. The rally on 22 September 2002 was a force with the potential to change laws by the very presence of the numbers of protesters who were law- abiding citizens and conscientious voters. The importance of this rally compared to the later and much bigger ‘Not in My Name’ rally of 2003, which mobilised similar people against Tony Blair’s policy in Iraq, was simply that the Countryside Alliance was fighting against legislation and attitudes that directly affected its members’ incomes and way of life, something far more potent and practi- cal than a march, however large, based upon moral values and legalistic principles alone and one unwilling to apply the violence that erupted at the fox hunting protest in Parliament Square. Nevertheless, the outcome was the same for both protests – abject failure. Thus, the middle classes learned the lesson that the state no longer served their needs. There is, however, still a place for the dedicated individual. Brian Haw’s longstanding encampment and vigil against a war and a war culture he considered immoral could claim a precedent in the one- man campaign for liberty waged by John Lilburne in the seven- teenth century. Such protest was later renewed in the campaign of the Barking activist Billy Bragg, who refused to his pay taxes while big bonuses were handed to the bosses of the Royal Bank of Scotland (his particular precedent being, perhaps, Henry David Thoreau in mid-nineteenth-century America). Such individual protests were focused reminders of the difference between what is perceived to be natural justice and what is seen to be parliamentary law, which are too often nowadays seen to be in opposition to one another. It would be naïve simply to take the claims of opposition move- ments as valid merely on their say so. After all, the state and gov- ernmental authority are pillars of social cohesion and stability and may not be rocked with impunity. There are always dangers to be avoided. The emergence of the English Defence League (EDL) has been one symptom of a growing number of new threats posed by right-wing groups, Islamic terrorists and environmental protesters – organisations which pose new problems for internal security.3 The various services dedicated to fighting these threats have had to adjust to areas of significance that are no longer focused on the Soviet

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2000: PREFACE TO DISORDER IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY 7 Union or Irish nationalism, which is not to say that the threat from both is not real, but simply that it is diminishing. After the murder in London of Alexander Litvinenko in November 2006, the deterio- ration of the relationship between Russia and the UK was so ‘seri- ous’ that a large part of the budget of the secret services had to be redirected to Cold-War-style counter intelligence, there being ‘no decrease in the numbers of undeclared Russian intelligence officers in the UK … conducting covert activity’, and there still remained lingering concerns regarding the potential activities of the Real IRA, the Continuity IRA and Northern Irish loyalists.4 As well as the immediate threat to the country of terrorism, there remains the perceived threat to the planet. The environmental agenda may not be as strongly represented as it once was, given the sharp diminishment of general public interest in global issues during 2010, but environmentalism will certainly not have vanished. To reinforce the idea that human-induced climate change is a reality and not more government propaganda to increase taxation, climate change protest may become more vociferous and extreme as the ‘message’ ceases to get through. This means that smaller, more targeted and possibly more ‘violent’ protests will occur at organisations that are perceived to be the worst polluters. Where climate change protest may succeed is in the area of restricting air traffic and saving local villages and green belt land. Such protests have a large public base of support and seem to follow the logic of various governments that have preached about the carbon footprint of excessive air travel. Here the wishes of the voting public and government policy often do coincide. There are other subtle ways in which the demands of voters and the needs of the state have diverged. Since 2007, there has been a growing criminalisation of space and movement, and authority has tightened its grip through sophisticated surveillance against physi- cal protest. Such authority nevertheless remains porous, subject as it is to intense pressure from the media, from watchdogs and from activists using cyberspace. Whilst it appears that current protests pit a multiplicity of interests against a stubborn singularity of authority (visible in the ranks of helmeted police officers), this is not the case, and the forces of security are themselves divided in terms of their aims and actions; the watchers are now watched by their own surveillance methods (especially CCTV and mobile phones). Will the nature of protest change to meet the new demands of forbidden geography and the importance of mass media?

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8 RIOT CITY This time the revolution will be televised. Protestors have for a decade embraced modern methods of communication and organisation, but they have also realised the importance of the world’s cameras and the possibilities of ‘virtual’ protest and of ‘staging’ an event, whether the smashing of a bank’s windows by a single person or creating carnivalesque situations that disarm authority and pro- vide the media with the best photo opportunity. All active dissent is marked by an adversarial position and a sequential course of events. Television and newspapers only operate in terms of the latter and as such protest may have to become more photo-friendly and less ideological if it wishes to be noticed. Such post-modern protests, in which the action stops in order for an ‘event’ to be properly filmed, suggest that simulation rather than participation will create pastiche protest or simulations organised precisely to be ‘looked at’ later in photographs, on mobile phone videos and on the Internet. Yet the camera distorts; the multiplicity of images bewilders. The image exists not in neutral space but within the media context of business, and its proliferation is only partially a matter of personal choice. The continuous television broadcast distorts by extension and manipulation of time sequences (what ‘has been’ is endlessly repeated in a loop of violence contained within a soundbite – it is always the present moment, frozen in time). Images are juxtaposed to create metaphors and similes, televised interviews with participants make ‘characters’ out of protestors and produce narratives of action. Moreover, ‘celebrity activists’ make protest into a ‘market of struggle’, reducing actions to personalities and campaigns into advertising.5 Every image comes with its corporate compensation; every Facebook entry or BlackBerry image (and every ‘tweet’) is subject to public and private surveillance. The photo is never neutral but is fixed in a politics of visual imagery that is itself toxic, because it seems so safe, so ‘non-hierarchical, so ‘leaderless’. Nevertheless, its very horizontality may mask vertical forms of control:6

When the Forward Intelligence Teams (FIT) aggressively film us, when we are only let out of kettles on condition we have our faces filmed, when we are arrested en masse in Trafalgar Square for breach of the peace just so our personal details can be taken, when police camera- men turn up to community meetings of environmentalists or to student occupations – when any of these occur, the message is clear: we control data, and we control you. By protecting what is ours, we deny the state control.7

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2000: PREFACE TO DISORDER IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY 9 Real lives, virtual architecture: the protest group ‘Anonymous’, a decentralised collective of cyber-culture enthusiasts, started in 2003. The ‘organisation’, which began as entertainment on the Internet, is a loosely organised and open network of ‘hactivists’ who use humour and cyber-attacks to further protest on behalf of absolute freedom of information and speech. The movement exists as an anarchic, free- flowing intelligence or ‘hive’ brain that organises and reorganises itself spontaneously and simultaneously through virtual contact. Its most successful campaigns have been to shut down government and financial websites in distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. The most publicised of these was in 2010 after the arrest of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, when PayPal, MasterCard and Visa were attacked after WikiLeaks’ assets were frozen, whilst on 3 February 2012, Anonymous successfully hacked into communications between the FBI and London Metropolitan Police. These varied potent forms of new media activism became visible to the general public around the time of the attack on Conservative Campaign Headquarters at 30 Millbank in late 2010. Then the papers reported that police had tried to coax protesters from the roof using Twitter, a situation that allowed Richard Littlejohn in the Daily Mail to speculate on the imbecility of the authorities trying to use the communications networks of their opponents, a method doomed to failure, not least because it was so ludicrously patronising and transparent.8 Where force may once have been used to restore order, there was merely the police tweeting; the signs of disorder had been misread. The Evening Standard ran an article on the use of social media in January 2011, highlighting the use of social networks to organ- ise demonstrations like ‘Dance Against the Deficit’, a lunchtime groove held in front of the Bank of England. Focusing on the new ‘clicktivism’ of those who use blogs, Twitter, online petitions and Facebook, the paper concentrated on the demands of UK Uncut who were then targeting high-street store owners and bank CEOs who avoided paying their taxes. With 13,000 online supporters in early 2011, the organisation seemed one to watch, as was ‘38 Degrees’, whose petition for dismissal of MPs by grassroots voters before an election received government support; or ‘False Economy’, set up partly with the Trades Union Congress and union donations, an information platform or hub, to show what was happening locally; or the ‘National Campaign Against the Cuts’, a network of students

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10 RIOT CITY unaffiliated to the National Union of Students and set up after a conference, which campaigns for free education and became one of the major bodies behind the student strikes in 2010.9 The authorities in the UK and elsewhere have become very aware of cyber-attack and have acted swiftly to shut down hactivists, making numerous arrests around the world, including a number in the UK. These protest groups do not just act in cyberspace, they also still act in the real environment of the streets, but when they demon- strate, they do so anonymously and wearing masks (the V-mask from the film V for Vendetta was first worn by ‘Anonymous’ in 2006). Such masks are a provocation, and although there are police pow- ers to remove facial coverings, the government and the opposition have united in calling for more enforcement. In the spring of 2011,

Figure 1.2 ‘Anonymous’ (author’s collection)

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INDEX

Adapting to Protest (HMIC), 3, 18 Attention Deficit Hyperactivity aesthetics, 138, 142 Disorder (ADHD), 102, 107 Afghanistan, 17, 30–1 Attlee, Clement, 152 ‘After the Riots’, 103–6 Atwan, Abdel Bari, 33 agents provocateurs, 46 authority issues, 59, 90, 106, 114, 119 Aitken, Jonathan, 124 avant-gardism, 127–30, 144 Al-Abdaly, T.A., 33 al-Qaeda, 31–3 Bakunin, Mikhail, 127, 132 Alexander, Heidi, 86 Baltic Exchange attack (1992), 162 Ali, Amir, 33 banking crisis (2008), 2, 5, 25, 28, 54, Ali, Clarice, 91 167n.20 Ali, Shahzad, 85 banks, attacks on, 118–19, 160 alienation, 101, 103, 105, 125, 127, 139, banners, 154–5, 157 140–2 Barber, Brendan, 73 alliances, marginal, 139–40 barricades, 78–9, 82 Althusser, Louis, 138 Barschak, Aaron, 41–2 anarchism, 1–3, 11, 14, 41, 73, 92, Batmanghelidjh, Camila, 103 128–36, 141, 150, 154, 158 baton rounds, 22, 24, 87, 95–6 Animal Liberation Front, 45 Baudrillard, Jean, 128–9 Anonymous, 3, 9–11, 158 Bawdy House Riots, 110–11, 122, anti-Americanism, 3, 13 159–60 anti-capitalism, 3, 17, 19–20, 23–8, 31, Benn, Tony, 49 45, 48–9, 72, 127, 134, 138 Bennett, Alan, 48 anti-Catholicism, 112–14, 119, 175n.26 Berkman, Alexander, 134–6 anti-fascism, 161 Biber, Aaron, 85 anti-semitism, 34, 49 ‘Big Society’, 13, 56–8, 71, 87, 123 anti-slavery symbols, 156–7 Birmingham Riots apprentice riots, 110–11, 122 (1981), 101, 107–8 Arab Spring, 17, 30, 57 (2011), 79, 83–5 Armed Wing of the TUC, 37–8, 40 Black Bloc, 12, 37, 72 arrests, 24, 30, 91, 96, 172n.20 Black Panthers, 135 arson, 79–82, 113–15, 117, 119, 172n.20 Blair, Tony, 6, 54, 55 Artaud, Antonin, 138 Blake, William, 115 Assange, Julian, 9, 13, 30, 49, 69 Blakelock, Keith, 76, 161 Atoh, David, 92 Blitz Spirit, 84, 87, 90

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178 INDEX

Bloody Sunday, 160 character building, 104–5 Bloomberg poll, 167n.20 Chartists, 155–6, 160, 176n.1 bonuses issue, 6, 18, 27 Chicago ’69 events, 139 Boudicca, 159 Chicago Anarchists (1887), 151 Bourges, Hervé, 140 Chishty, Mak, 98 Bow Street Runners, 155, 160 Chiswick Eyot, 51 Bowes, Richard Mannington, 85 Choudhry, Roshonara, 33 Bowling, Jim, 46 Chowdhury, Mohammed, 32 Bragg, Billy, 6 Church of England, 25 Brailsford, Ben, 27 citizenship, 13, 71, 90, 92, 99 Brandreth, Jeremiah, 156 civil liberties, 12, 39, 48 Bratton, Bill, 87 Clarke, Brodie, 29 Brautigan, Richard, 144 class divisions, 48, 55–6, 68–70, 75, Brazier, Colin, 173n.49 85, 90–2, 98, 101, 107–9, 125, 144 breakaway groups, 39, 59–60, 64–5 Class War, 3, 41 Breivik, Anders Behring, 30 Clause IV (Labour Constitution), 153 British Union of Fascists, 148, 161 clearing up after riots, 84, 87, 120 Brixton GAS gang, 98 Cleaver, Eldridge, 135, 140 Brixton Riots (1981), 101, 107–8, 161 Clegg, Nick, 56, 59–60, 62, 64 Broadhurst, Bob, 20, 21–2, 65–6 climate change, 7, 70 Broadwater Farm riots (1985), 76, 93, Coalition of Resistance, 4 101, 161 Cobra meetings, 86–7 Browne Review, 55 cockades, 147–8 Buckingham Palace, 62, 64 Cohn-Bendit, Danny, 137 bundschuh symbol, 146 Cold War politics, 7, 31, 131, 144 Burdett, Francis, 156 colonialism, 75 Burgess, Anthony, 125 comedy terrorism, 41–2 Burls, Andrew, 172n.20 commoner’s green, 146 communalism, 131, 134–5, 143 Cable, Vince, 64 community values, 56, 71, 98, 101, Calder, John, 141 105–7, 125 Caldwell, Sue, 66 compensation, 89, 100, 121 Cameron, David, 20, 32, 44, 56–8, Conant, Nathaniel, 155 62–3, 82, 86–9, 91, 100, 102, Connell, Jim, 151–2 105, 109 Conservative Campaign Campbell, Michael, 30 Headquarters attack, 5, 9, 16, Canterbury, Archbishop of, 90 18–22, 40, 44, 59–60, 162 capitalism, 104, 131, 132, 132–4, 135, conspicuous consumption, 73, 107 136, 137 conspiracies, 33, 41 see also anti-capitalism consumerism, 93, 104, 108, 121–2, Cartrain, 60 125, 131, 138 CCTV, see surveillance Cooper, Yvette, 11, 22 Cenotaph incident, 68–9 corruption, 43–4, 54–5, 71, 105

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INDEX 179 counter-terrorism, 34–5, 51, 164–5n.1 Donovan, Reece, 172n.20 Countryside Alliance, 6 drugs, 77, 103, 140, 163n.3 Courtney, William, 146 Duggan, Mark, 76–8, 86, 88–9, 93–4, crimes 101, 126, 162 gang, 86–7, 90–2, 96–9, 101–2 Duncan, Sue, 86 gun, 76, 78, 80, 83, 125 hate, 34–5 Easton, Kelvin, 77 knife, 96–9, 106, 125 Eastside Young Leader’s Academy, criminalisation, 7, 86, 96 106–7 Croydon, 79–80 economic causes, 90, 93 Culpepper Minute Men, 148 economic downturn, 17, 21, 44, 54, cultural contexts, 59, 85, 98, 101, 103, 56, 126 125, 127, 133 education Cumberland, Richard, 119 as a right, 55–6, 70, 72, 90 custard pie attacks, 29, 41–3 as a solution, 104–5 cutbacks, 17–18, 21, 27, 37, 71 Educational Maintenance cyber-attacks, 9–10, 30–1, 50, 83, 126 Allowance (EMA), 27, 56, 60, 66, 70 Dadaism, 139 electronic ‘tasers’, 29, 50 Daily Express, 84, 86 Eliot, John, 121 Daily Mail, 9, 64, 72, 92 Ellis, Paul, 99 Dale Farm protest, 29 Ellis, Trevor, 80 Dance Against the Deficit, 9 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 136 Davies, Peter, 93 English Defence League (EDL), 6, Debord, Guy, 139 29–31, 49, 83, 85–6, 163n.3 Deech, Baroness, 168n.10 Enlightenment, 59, 157 democracy issues, 53, 59, 70–1 entrapment, 46, 61 Derrida, Jacques, 145 environmentalism, 6–7, 36, 45 Desuze, Darrell, 85 escalation levels/areas, 94–5 Desuze, Lavinia, 85 ethnic issues, 82, 85, 96, 98, 120, 140 deterrence, 107, 124 Evening Standard, 9, 24, 41, 48, 60, 62, Diarrassouba, Seydou, 98 77, 80, 82, 100, 103 Diggers, 146 evictions, 24–5, 41, 91 discipline, 106–7, 124 dis/empowerment, 5, 25, 123 Fahy, Peter, 94 disrespectful identity, 139 Falkvinge, Rick, 11 distrust of police/state, 2–3, 14, 36, Families and Children Study (2004), 47, 71, 101, 108–9, 125, 164–5n.1 105 diversity of rioters, 91–2, 96, 111, families, focus on, 104–5 118–19 Farrell, Terry, 51 Dixon-Ali, Chantelle, 91 fascism, 1, 133, 161 DIY protest, 19–20 FBI, 50 Dobson, Gary, 18, 164n.1 Ferrandino, Joseph, 141

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180 INDEX

Ferry, Otis, 68 Gordon Riots (1780), 111–22, 148, Fielding, John, 115 159–60 Finsbury Square anti-capitalist Gove, Michael, 21, 66 camp, 24–5, 27 Government of the Dead, 41 fire extinguisher incidents, 66–8 government reactions, 86–90 Fitz Osbert, William, 25, 159 grafitti, 61–2 ‘5 Days in August’ (IRCVP), 103 Grant, Nathaniel, 98 flags, 146–57, 176n.1 Grayling, Christopher, 109 Flello, Robert, 89 Greany, Chris, 91 Florence Lockwood banner, 157 green politics, 11, 45 fortification of sensitive sites, 47, Greenpeace, 3, 47 51–2 The Guardian, 18, 49, 54, 61, 72, Fortnum & Mason occupation, 27, 101 37, 39, 48, 72, 74 The Guardian/LSE survey, 18, 101 Forward Intelligence Teams, 8, 68 Guerrilla Gardening, 2, 39, 162 Foucault, Michel, 129, 141 Gul, Mohammed, 33 Fox Hunting riot (2004), 68 Fraser, Giles, 25 hactivism, 9–10 freedom of information/speech, 9, Hamza, Abu, 32 11, 52–3, 102 Harvey, Susan, 102 French Revolution, 122, 149, 150 Harwood, Simon, 18 Freudianism, 129 Haw, Brian, 6, 26, 41, 71 future as ideological project, 127–8 Hawkins, John, 147 Hayden, Tom, 133, 139 G20 protests, 3, 18, 36, 39, 41, 60 Headingley, A.S., 152 Galliano, John, 33 Henry, Patrick, 148 gang culture, 101, 103, 125 Herbert, Nick, 61 see also crimes hippies/yippies, 138 Gapes, Mike, 33 hipsterism, 133 Gateley, Kevin, 161 HMIC reports, 3, 18, 23, 166–7n.16 Gaza protest, 39 Hoare, Sarah, 112 Geismer, Alain, 137 Hobby, Russell, 66 gentlemen’s associations, 147 Hoffman, Abbie, 130, 133, 138–9, gesamtkunstwerk, 143 142 Ghodse, Hamid, 163n.3 Hogan-Howe, Bernard, 23, 86, 96 Gilbert, David, 140 homophobia, 34 Gillies, Malcolm, 168n.10 hoodie, 109 Gilmour, Charlie, 68–9 Hope, Lord, 39 global village, 12, 138, 139 hopelessness, 19, 104, 109 Godwin, Tim, 30, 48, 50 horizontality, 8, 14 Goldman, Emma, 134–6 human rights, 39–40, 52, 71, 91, Goldman Sachs, 27–8 168n.20 Gordon, Lord George, 111–12, 117–18, humour, 40–2 160 Hussein-Ece, Baroness, 90

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INDEX 181

ICT, 3, 7–9, 12, 138 Kafunda, John, 172n.20 identity issues, 137, 144 Kamaleswaran, Thusha, 98 images of protest, 8, 17–18 Kaufman, Gerald, 153 immigration, 29–30 Kennedy, Mark, 45–6 Independent Riots Communities kettling, 21, 23–4, 37–40, 61, 64–5, and Victims Panel reports, 70–1, 75, 168n.20 103–6 Kibbo Kift, 147 individualism, 14, 38, 58, 128, 134–7 Kingston Crown Court, 69, 70 inequalities, 2, 90, 92–3 Knight, Christopher, 41, 65 inner-city riots (2011), 15–16, 17–18, Knowles, Graeme, 25 27, 35–6, 40, 44, 48, 162 Kolawole, Kazeem, 98 build-up to, 21, 76–8, 86, 88–9, Kropotkin, Peter, 135, 136 93–4 gang crimes, 86–7, 90–2, 96–9 Labour Party, 5, 54–5, 58, 71, 153–4 police tactics review, 94–6 Laing, R.D., 143 political responses, 20, 22, 86–90 Lamartine, Alphonse de, 151, 157 public reactions, 81, 84–5, 91–3 Lammy, David, 77, 89, 103 spread of, 78–81, 79, 82–3 Land Leagues, 151 underlying issues, 122–6 Langdale’s gin distillery, 117, 119 insurance companies, 121 language of protest, 3, 145 inward/external values, 122–3, Latham, John, 138, 141 141–2 law/freedom paradox, 36 IPCC, 43, 68, 70–1, 76–7, 170n.24 Lawrence, Stephen, 18, 164n.1, 174n.20 IRA, 7, 30, 161 leaderlessness, 11, 69 Iraq War, 6, 26, 33, 43, 71 Leary, Timothy, 138, 143 Irish nationalism, 7, 29–31, 147, 160, Leavis, F.R., 139 161 left/right divisions, 48–9, 169n.33 Irish Times, 107, 110 legislation, 26, 32, 52, 100, 121 Isagba, Beau, 172n.20 Legister, Shevonne, 97 Islam, 6, 29–32, 34, 49, 106–7 Lenin, V.I., 2 Ives, Chelsea, 91 Lennon, John, 129, 141 Lennon, Stephen, 49 Jacobins, 151, 155 Lester, Ed, 169n.3 Jagger, Bianca, 49 Levellers, 146 Jahan, Haroon, 85 Levitas, Ruth, 105 Jahan, Tariq, 85 Lewis, Ray, 99, 106–7 James, Leroy, 98 Leyton Marshes, 51 Jarrett, Cynthia, 76 Liberal Democrats, 56, 59–61, 63–4, Jenkinson, Charles, 113 69, 71 John, Elton, 69 libertarianism, 3, 11, 66, 71, 114, 116, Johnson, Boris, 24, 44, 48, 51, 73, 82 128, 130–1, 154 Johnson, Laura, 91 Liberty report, 36–40, 43 Jung, Carl, 143 Lilburne, John, 6, 71 justice issues, 2, 6, 92–3 Linton, James, 156

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182 INDEX

Littlejohn, Richard, 9 middle classes, 5–6, 68, 71–2, 101, Litvinenko, Alexander, 7 108, 111, 120, 122 Livingstone, Justice, 50 Mile End park, 27 Livingstone, Ken, 72 military intervention, 112–14, 117–18, Lloyd, David, 158 121 London dock strike (1889), 151 Miller, Hayley, 84 London School of Economics, 18, Milliband, Ed, 71–3, 88 101, 132–3 Moon Against the Monarchy, 41 looting, 19–20, 78–82, 109, 119, 121, 124 Moore, Alan, 158 Lyons silk riots (1831), 154 moral agendas, 2, 6, 16, 48, 54–6, Lyotard, Jean-Francois, 128 71–2, 99, 122–3, 131, 167n.20 Mosley, Oswald, 161 Mackey, Craig, Deputy Mountstuart, Lord, 119 Commissioner, 164–5n.1 MPS Briefing Report, 94–5 Macpherson Inquiry, 164–5n.1 multicultural cooperation, 85 Macroidan, Patrick, 41 multiple causes/values, 3, 7, 14, 55, magistrates, irresolute, 113–14 101, 107–9, 119, 122 Mailer, Norman, 133 Munro, Charlene, 86 Malone, Larry, 97 Müntzer, Thomas, 146 Malo’s silk business, 112, 114 Murdoch, Rupert, 29, 41–3 Manchester, 82–3, 94 Musavir, Abdul, 85 Mandel, Ernest, 137 Muslims against Crusades, 31, 34 Marbles, Jonnie, 41–3 mutual aid, 136, 140 March for the Alternative, 27, 37, 72 Marcuse, Herbert, 130, 137–8, 141 National Campaign Against Fees marginal revolt, 139–40 and Cuts (NCAFC), 9, 23, Marx, Eleanor, 150 69–70 Marxism, 2, 129–32, 135–8, 140, 144 National Domestic Extremism Unit, mask-wearing, 10, 13, 62, 79, 91, 158 44–5 Mason, Paul, 54 National Public Order Intelligence Matthews, Susan, 70–1 Unit, 44–5 Maxwell, Kevin, 164n.1 National Union of Students, 60, May, Theresa, 11, 22, 29, 44 63, 69 McCalla, Anthony, 98 Nechaev, Sergei, 132 McIntyre, Jody, 70 neoliberalism, 14, 19 McLuhan, Marshall, 12, 138 Nevin, Ursula, 92 Meadows, Alfie, 70 New Labour, 5, 153–4 Meagher, Thomas, 157 New Leftism, 131, 133, 142 media coverage, 8–9, 17, 84–5, 98, 108 Newfield, Jack, 135 Menezes, Jean Charles de, 50, 101 Newgate Prison, 115–16, 148 Merry Pranksters, 138 News of the World, 18, 65 Merthyr Tydfil iron workers, 150 Newton, Huey, 54 MI5, 30, 34, 45 NHS, 18, 60 Michel, Louise, 154 nihilism, 103, 107

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INDEX 183

Niqab, 33 distrust of, 2–3, 14, 36, 47, 101, Noades, Novello, 92 108–9, 125 Noble, Ronald, 30 intelligence, 44–5, 73 Noon, Paul, 75 racism, allegations of, 164–5n.1 Noonan, Desmond, 77 tactical policy, 30–1, 44 Nore Mutiny, 149 tactics, 37–40, 39, 43–4, 46, 61, Norris, David, 18, 164n.1 64–5, 70–1, 75, 79, 94–6 ‘Not in My Name’ rally (2002), 6 unpreparedness, 21–2, 35–6, Notting Hill riot (1958), 161 59–60, 64, 80–1, 86, 105 police van incident, 61 O’Brien, William, 157 policing by consent, 36–7, 72 O’Donald, Mary, 112 political processions, 154 O’Shea, Danny, 97 politics, negation of, 135 Occupy London, 23–5, 31, 37, 39, Poll Tax protests (1990), 5, 71–2 47–8, 50, 51, 63, 72–4 Porter, Aaron, 69 offensive free speech, 52–3 post-modernism, 8, 11, 122, 129 Oglesby, Carl, 135, 137 post-proletarian mentalities, 131 Old Bailey, 97, 164n.1 poverty, 5, 25, 103, 108, 118, 126 Oldfield, Trenton, 51 Powell, Enoch, 98 Olympics (2012), 18, 25, 32, 44, 50, Power, Camillia, 41 51, 66, 95, 126 pragmatic approach, 39, 123 opportunism, 82, 97, 101 privatisation, 55, 153 oppositional culture, 127, 135, 142 pro-Palestinian demonstrations, 32 Owens, Lynne, 22, 26, 40, 72–3 psychological perspectives, 122, 131 Oxford and Cambridge boat race, 51 public reactions, 60, 81, 84–5

Paine, Tom, 157 Qatada, Abu, 33 Palestinian Society (LSE), 34 Quelch, Harry, 152 Paris riots (1968), 130, 132 Parker, Richard, 149 Radical Student Alliance, 133 Parliament, 1, 62, 90, 111–12, 114 radicalism, 58, 71, 128, 130–3, 145, 157 Parliament Square, 26–7, 64 Rand, Ayn, 133–4 peace camp, 26, 41 Reclaim the Streets, 46 Peach, Blair, 161 The Red Flag (Connell), 151–3 Pearton, Nicholas, 97 Redmond-Bate v. Director of Public Peasants’ Revolt (1381), 146, 159 Prosecutions, 52 Pendry, Julia, 68 redundancy, 129 Peterloo Massacre, 155 Rees, Carla, 100 phone-hacking scandal, 18, 65 rehabilitation, 124 Phrygian cap, 150, 157 Reich, Wilhelm, 143 Pickles, Eric, 84–5 Reid, Natasha, 91 Pirate Parties, 11–13 Reign of Terror (France), 151 police, 9, 18, 79, 83, 95 religious dissent, 156 crowd-control resources, 22–3 rendition, 33

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184 INDEX

representation issues, 144 Sky News, 61, 124 Republican Socialist Party, 158 Smith, Andrew, 88 republicanism, 114, 116 Smith, Gary, 34 revenge responses, 87–8 Smith, Karl, 172n.20 Reynolds, Frederick, 111, 115 Snow, Michael, Judge, 48 Rhodesia, 132–3 Snyder, Gary, 137 right/left divisions, 48–9, 169n.33 social networking, 9, 39, 59 right-wing groups, 6, 29–31, 49, 83, socialism, 2–3, 127, 128, 131, 133, 144, 150 85–6, 160–1 Socialist Workers Party, 62 Robinson, Nicholas, 93 Spa Fields demonstration (1816), Rocker, Rudolf, 134 154–6, 160 Rodhouse, Steve, 102 Speaker’s Corner, 52 Roscoe, Elizabeth, Judge, 92 Spence, Thomas, 156 Rossli, Haziq, 85, 172n.20 Spithead mutiny, 149 royal family, 27, 40–1, 41, 64–5, spontaneity, 137 73–4, 84, 161 squatting, 13, 24, 50 rubber bullets see baton rounds Stafford, John, 156 Russia, 7, 144 stakeholder perspective, 103–4 Russian Nihilists, 151 Starkey, David, 98 Stephenson, Paul, 20–1, 39, 43, 65 St Paul’s anti-capitalist camp, 23–5, Stevens, Dave, 137 31, 167n.18 Stevens, Lord John, 20 Salah, Raed, 33 Stirner, Max, 135 Sallon, Philip, 34 Stockwell, London, 98 Sanchez, Inatiez, 120 stop and search, 21, 32, 50, 79, 108–9 Sauvageot, J., 137 Stop the War Coalition, 66 schoolchildren, 60–2, 65–7 Strategic Defence and Security Review, Scott, Lee, 33 31–2 Seale, Bobby, 133, 139 strategic planning, 39, 115 Seaton, Nick, 66 Strathclyde initiative, 106 secondary disturbances, 39–40, 47 Stuart, Charles, 118–19 secret police, 45, 53 Stuart, Graham, 66 security concerns, 6–7, 29–34, 50–3 student activism, 9–10, 14–15, 18–19, Sedley, Lord Justice, 52 27, 123, 129–31, 133, 162 self-determination, 135, 137 student riots (2010), 15–16, 17–18, 21, sentencing, 67, 69, 91–3, 124 39–40, 162 7/7 attacks, 18, 101 build-up to, 54–9 Shaftesbury, Earl of, 147 main events, 59–65 shoplifting see looting schoolchildren, 60–2, 65–7 shops vandalised, 62, 72, 78, 81, 83, victims, 70–1 109, 172n.20 students’ manifesto, 58–9 Siege of Sidney Street (1911), 161 Suffragettes, 1, 150, 157 Skelmanthorpe banner, 154–5 suicide bombers, 50 Skoob Towers, 138 Summerskill, Ben, 34–5

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INDEX 185

The Sun, 84, 91 Tudway, Adrian, 30, 45 surveillance, 7–8, 45 tuition fees, 23, 27, 55–7, 62–3, 70–1, CCTV, 36, 44, 51, 85, 87, 90–2, 123 157, 169n.3 cyber, 35–6, 51 Twitter, 9, 36–7 undercover, 45–6 Tyler, Wat, 16, 159 symbols of protest, 146–57 systemic corruption, 2, 28 UK Uncut, 3, 9, 12, 23, 27, 36, 42–3, 72 Underground bomb attack, 162 Tacitus, 159 Underwood, Karen, 72 Taibbi, Matt, 27–8 unemployment, 17, 20–1, 27, 56, 99, Tapsell, Peter, 88 109 taser guns, 29, 50, 95 unifying symbols, 146–57 tax avoidance, 9, 18, 70, 73 US Embassy, 51–2 tax refusal, 6 USA, 13, 131–6, 139, 149 tented communities, 23–8, 31, 47 terrorism, 6, 7, 29–32, 34, 49–50, V for Vendetta, 10, 158 128, 139 Vaz, Keith, 74 Thatcher, Margaret, 55, 57–8, 153, 158 Verges, Jacques, 34 theatrical elements, 8, 123, 142 victims, 70–1, 85–6, 117–18 theory as narrative, 129, 144 Vietnam, 89, 133, 161 Thistlewood, Arthur, 160 vigilantism, 85–6, 163n.3 Thom, John, 146 violence, 2, 15, 20, 60, 77–8, 82–3, 85 Thompson, Anthony Worrall, 166n.4 see also crimes Thompson, Gordon, 172n.20 The Voice poll, 164n.1 Thoreau, David, 6, 136 Thornhill, John, 44 Wagner, Richard, 143 Thrale, Hester, 120 Wallace, William, 159 The Times, 68, 83 water cannons, 22, 84, 87, 95 Timms, Stephen, 33 Webb, Sidney, 153 Tolstoy, Leo, 136 Wedderburn, Robert, 156 Tomlinson, Ian, 18, 36, 60, 160 Wedgwood, Josiah, 155 totalitarianism, 133, 158 wellbeing, 62, 123 Toxteth Riots (1981), 101, 107–8 Westwood, Ben, 48 trains, used by rioters, 78–80 WikiLeaks, 9, 12–13, 30, 49 transcendence, 142 Wilkes, John, 117–18, 150 transparency, 11, 37, 40 Woollard, Edward, 60, 66 tricolour flags, 156–8 working class, 129–30 Trocchi, Alexander, 137 Wyatt, Thomas, 159 Trojan Horse incident, 37–8, 40 troops to teachers plan, 21 YouGov poll, 84, 93 Trotskyism, 3 YouTube, 78, 85 Troubled Families Programme, 105 TUC, 9, 27, 37, 58, 72–3 zero-tolerance approach, 50–1 Tucker, Barbara, 41 Zionism, 49

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