tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/violence-in-britain-10056/articlesviolence in Britain – The Conversation2019-03-13T15:06:39Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1134112019-03-13T15:06:39Z2019-03-13T15:06:39ZFootball violence: attacks by fans on players are abhorrent, but there’s no need for knee-jerk reactions<p>British football is once again under the microscope for all the wrong reasons. In the tenth minute of the Second City Derby between Birmingham City and Aston Villa on March 10, a Blues supporter evaded stewards, ran on to the pitch and <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-47523268">attacked Villa’s captain Jack Grealish</a>. The assault came less than 48 hours <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2019/03/08/scottish-footballs-fan-problem-worsens-man-runs-pitch-shove/">after an altercation</a> in which a Hibernian fan confronted James Tavernier of Rangers in the Scottish Premiership. This was soon followed by another pitch invasion in which an Arsenal supporter <a href="https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/sport/football/man-utd-arsenal-pitch-invader-15953100">appeared to shove</a> Manchester United’s Chris Smalling.</p>
<p>This spate of incidents has reignited the debate on disorder in football, with new focus on the safety of the players on the pitch. Former professionals <a href="https://www.supersport.com/general/news/190311_Shearer_warns_lives_could_be_at_risk_after_pitch_invasions">speculated</a> on what might have happened had the offenders been carrying weapons, with <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47519794">the stabbing of tennis player Monica Seles</a> in 1993 used as a cautionary tale. </p>
<p>The man involved in the Grealish incident, Paul Mitchell, 27, has been jailed for 14 weeks and a range of preventative measures have been mooted. The imposition of “<a href="http://www.parliament.scot/S5MembersBills/draft_consultation_strict_liability_Scottish_football_clubs_NEW_WEBSITE_OCT_17.pdf">strict liability</a>” on football clubs for the offending behaviour of their fans – with a ladder of sanctions including points deductions and playing behind closed doors – has been suggested <a href="https://www.heraldscotland.com/sport/17195713.clubs-must-face-sanctions-for-crowd-disorder-fines-games-behind-closed-doors-even-being-docked-points/">as deterrent</a> by various pundits, despite little evidence of their effectiveness. </p>
<p>Changes to the infrastructure of stadia, including netting, moats, and even the return of perimeter fences to provide more robust physical barriers between fans and the pitch have also been proposed, despite the known <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=bjiSBAAAQBAJ&pg=PT98&lpg=PT98&dq=including+netting,+moats+and+perimeter+fences+football&source=bl&ots=4de_THYZzG&sig=ACfU3U03bGSnIkCFiHJ4LMi7l0Rdt1SNSg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwizsf_z9P7gAhVSVRUIHaugB4UQ6AEwCHoECAUQAQ#v=onepage&q=including%20netting%2C%20moats%20and%20perimeter%20fences%20football&f=false">risks to health and safety</a> that these restrictions pose. These risks have been evident in <a href="https://www.stadiumguide.com/timelines/stadium-disasters/">successive stadium disasters</a> and barriers have been considered unthinkable since the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diavhiUso5E">Hillsborough tragedy of 1989</a>, when 96 Liverpool fans were crushed to death during an FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest. </p>
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<p>Former Birmingham City midfielder <a href="https://twitter.com/cotterill_david/status/1105112095367020544">David Cotterill</a> went as far as advocating the deployment of armed officers to protect players, recalling the time Bobby Robson suggested that police should “turn the flamethrowers on them”, following the violence and disorder that <a href="https://millwall-forum.vitalfootball.co.uk/threads/millwall-v-ipswich-riot-1978.10/">marred a cup tie</a> between Millwall and Ipswich in 1978.</p>
<p>What is the significance of these recent pitch invasions and the ensuing debate on player safety? Do they signal a return to the “dark days” of football hooliganism? </p>
<h2>A notorious time</h2>
<p>When were these so-called dark days? The most notorious 15-year period of football hooliganism in the 1970s and 1980s was bookended by two notable interventions by the football authorities. In 1971, the Football Association closed Manchester United’s home ground, Old Trafford, for their opening two games after fans threw knives and darts at visiting supporters the previous season. In May 1985 all English clubs were banned from European competition in the aftermath of the <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-32898612">Heysel Stadium disaster</a> in Brussels, in which 39 people died and 600 were injured after fans were crushed against a wall that then collapsed during the European Cup final between Liverpool and Juventus. </p>
<p>The major change to regulation of crowd management followed the publication of the <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-19574492">Taylor Report in 1990</a> in the wake of Hillsborough. While aimed at improving crowd safety, Lord Justice Taylor’s <a href="https://sgsa.org.uk/regulation/all-seated-football-stadia">recommendation for all-seated stadia</a> was enacted alongside a raft of other measures, including the increased use of CCTV at football stadiums as well as an extension of the legal power to ban individuals from football matches and criminalising encroachment onto the pitch.</p>
<p>These changes have had <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14660970.2014.961374">a significant impact</a> on the experience of watching live football, deterring and restricting the “hooligan element” and attracting a new type of family audience.</p>
<p>But it’s important not to overstate the extent of change. The post-Taylor era has been punctuated by isolated episodes of serious disorder. Major crowd trouble in <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1209028/Man-stabbed-West-Ham-Millwall-fans-brawl-outside-stadium.html">2009-10</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2013/apr/13/millwall-fa-cup-violence-wembley">2012-13</a> led to similar soul searching about the “curse” of football hooligans and demands for it to be stamped out once and for all. </p>
<h2>‘They think it’s all over’</h2>
<p>Can disorder ever be totally eradicated from football? Perhaps not. But the long arc of British football is undoubtedly bending towards <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0193723515615177">less violence</a> (see graph below). The arrest rate for the whole of last season was <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/46220337">3.5 per 100,000 fans</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263648/original/file-20190313-123554-e3s2yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263648/original/file-20190313-123554-e3s2yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263648/original/file-20190313-123554-e3s2yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=366&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263648/original/file-20190313-123554-e3s2yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=366&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263648/original/file-20190313-123554-e3s2yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=366&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263648/original/file-20190313-123554-e3s2yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=460&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263648/original/file-20190313-123554-e3s2yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=460&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263648/original/file-20190313-123554-e3s2yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=460&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The number of football-related arrests has steadily declined since 1985.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Home Office</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>Serious violence and crime at other major events – <a href="https://www.standard.co.uk/arts/music/stone-roses-gigs-blamed-for-huge-crime-rise-in-finsbury-park-8779314.html">whether large concerts and festivals</a> or <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/horse-racing/44106914">horse racing</a> – does not seem to induce the same level of opprobrium or moral panic. The widespread media coverage of football amplifies the spectacle of disorder, leading with depressing inevitability to the type of copycat behaviour witnessed at the weekend. And the attraction of a clampdown lies in the view that football fans (as a collective group) are inherently disposed to violence. </p>
<p>We should guard against the urge to treat anyone who encroaches on the field of play as a threat to player safety. There are clearly very different reasons for why a fan might encroach on the pitch – to ensure their own safety, as part of a protest or civil disobedience and, of course, celebration. Only a tiny minority are malign in intent. </p>
<p>Indeed, it is somewhat ironic that the most celebrated phrase in English football – <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg2CXkJVCHk">those immortal words</a>: “Some people are on the pitch, they think it’s all over”, uttered by commentator Kenneth Wolstenholme in the 1966 World Cup Final – was in reference to pitch invaders at Wembley celebrating what they thought was the final whistle signalling England’s triumph. </p>
<p>Let me be clear – professional footballers have an unequivocal right to work in an environment free from the threat of violence. This is also true of teachers, nurses, paramedics, prison officers – to name a few professionals who face regular violence and intimidation in their workplace. But it is also accepted that it is unreasonable to expect all risk to be eradicated in these public spaces, especially when such protection begins to impinge on civil liberties. </p>
<p>The relevant stakeholders in football must, of course, tackle the issue of player safety. But the debate about how to police football crowds effectively needs to avoid knee-jerk reactions to isolated incidents. Engagement with fan groups and representatives – alongside clubs and police – are essential to develop more pro-social and sustainable solutions. Dialogue is a not a panacea, but it is essential for meaningful progress to continue.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/113411/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Daniel Fitzpatrick does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A series of attacks by fans on players recently raised the spectre of a return to the bad old days of the 1970s and 1980s.Daniel Fitzpatrick, Lecturer in Politics, Aston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/255172014-05-13T12:08:11Z2014-05-13T12:08:11ZViolence in Britain: how the war on terror criminalises ordinary people<p>It is now accepted that the <a href="http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415607209/">war on terror</a> has generated an extensive repertoire of its very own terror. Drone strikes resulting in extrajudicial killings, rendition and torture – zones of exception like Guantanamo Bay come to mind, as does Britain’s complicity in <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-25445869">extraordinary rendition and torture</a>. </p>
<p>Then there are the normalised, everyday forms of terror operational in Britain that rarely register as state-sanctioned violence because they are understood to keep us safe. This includes MI5 and police raids without charge, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/law/2013/dec/05/asian-people-stopped-uk-borders-analysis">compulsory schedule 7 detention and questioning</a> and <a href="http://www.stop-watch.org/experiences/">stop and search</a> of communities made suspect.</p>
<p>Even less visible as state violence is the global regime of targeted sanctions against non-state armed actors and those even indirectly connected to them. UN Security Council Resolution 1373 requires states to establish their own domestic banning regimes in order to criminalise the support and financing for terrorism. Variously referred to as “blacklisting”, “banning” or “proscription”, the designation of organisations and individuals as terrorist has been <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/libertycentral/2010/dec/10/terrorist-blacklisting-un-report-human-rights">under scrutiny</a> for bearing all the hallmarks of authoritarian dictatorships. </p>
<p>These forms of “lawfare”, including the <a href="http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/11/contents">Terrorism Act 2000 (UK)</a>, criminalise diverse forms of association and support, without requiring intentional acts of violence against civilians. This creates serious consequences for many diaspora in the UK – including Tamils, Kurds, Baluch and Palestinians – who remain connected to armed struggles for self-determination by virtue of being a people with a shared historical and political culture.</p>
<p>Terrorist listing makes no distinction between armed conflicts and terrorism. Worse, listing transforms diverse armed conflicts into terrorism in spite of whether armed groups are fighting an authoritarian regime or responding to state terror. Clearly, many non-state armed groups have terrorised and killed civilians and breached the laws of war. But by labelling non-state actors as <em>a priori</em> terrorists, the political claims of non-state actors, and the root causes of armed conflicts, are denied and diverse forms of state terror are legitimated as “counter-terrorism”.</p>
<p>This effect <a href="http://antoniocassese.com/italiano/oxford_jurnal/the_proper_limits_of.pdf">has been described</a> by international legal jurist Antonio Cassese as institutionalised violence. Banning organisations is a tool of British foreign policy which functions as institutionalised state violence in three key ways: firstly by denying the application of international law and principles of self-determination; secondly, by foreclosing opportunities for peaceful settlement of conflict; and thirdly, by legitimating and facilitating state terror and repressions and in some cases the war crimes of other states.</p>
<h2>Turning armed conflict into terrorism</h2>
<p>The UK has been proscribing organisations since listing Northern Irish groups, most notably through the <a href="http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/hmso/pta1974.htm">Prevention of Terrorism Act 1974</a>. More than 60 militant non-state actors are <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/301777/ProscribedOrganisationsApril14.pdf">currently banned in the UK</a> (as of April 2014). Some of these actors have used armed conflict to further political claims for statehood, regional autonomy or ethno-cultural rights and have a broad support base – for example, the Baluch, Palestinians, Tamils, Basque, among other peoples. </p>
<p>Some non-state armed groups (and nation states) breach the laws of war by targeting civilians. But listing does <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17539153.2013.765706#.U3H3ivldXsY">nothing to stop the use of terror by either side</a>. The idea is that by criminalising the broadest range of relationships connected to armed conflict, Britain can de-legitimise the organisation and eradicate its support base. What does this look like when the support base for an armed conflict demands recognition of minority cultures and languages, accountability for state crimes and an end to conflict? Let’s take the example of how the Kurdish struggle for self-determination in Turkey has been transformed into “terrorism”.</p>
<p>The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) is listed by Britain as a terrorist organisation, yet the PKK is currently engaged in fragile negotiations for peace with Turkey. Meanwhile, listing of the PKK as terrorist by the international community has given Turkey the confidence and legitimacy to embark on a mass criminalisation of Kurdish civil society. Between 2009 and the start of 2013, <a href="http://en.firatnews.com/news/features/turkey-s-terrorism-report.htm">almost 40,000 people</a> were prosecuted for “membership of a terrorist organisation” in Turkey, according to government statistics. </p>
<p>In its campaign to urge the British government to lift its ban against the PKK, the campaign group Peace in Kurdistan <a href="http://peaceinkurdistancampaign.wordpress.com/activities/new-appeal-lift-the-ban-on-the-pkk/">argues that the ban</a> “distorts the whole political process by ensuring that anyone who expresses an opinion on controversial issues in Turkey can be held to be an associate of terrorism and prosecuted with the full force of a law that is as indiscriminate as it is unjust.”</p>
<p>In Britain, Kurds are routinely criminalised and terrorised by the fact of this proscription, but no-one has been convicted of any offences. This is because the Home Office identifies “disruption” of forms of association and material support, rather than prosecution, as the key object of the proscription regime. The UK <a href="http://books.google.com.au/books?id=SzfWbs7gywoC&pg=RA1-PA72&lpg=RA1-PA72&dq=The+UK+is+at+the+forefront+of+EU+member+States%27+action+against+the+PKK&source=bl&ots=3ySvz_DCel&sig=1Bp5mB-GnmTKzfOYsd_uW4rgQ44&hl=en&sa=X&ei=K0FFU4COBceIkQXSkoCoBg&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=The%20UK%20is%20at%20the%20forefront%20of%20EU%20member%20States%27%20action%20against%20the%20PKK&f=false">positions itself</a> “at the forefront of EU member states’ action against the PKK”. Kurdish activists are routinely harassed by police and intelligence agencies in the UK, often as part of co-ordinated operations targeting Kurds across Europe. </p>
<p>For example, in 2011, more than a dozen Kurds were sent the message by MI5 that their fundraising for charities, campaign work and their organising in community centres should stop, or they would face deportation or criminal charges. On January 10 2013, Kurdish families travelling to Paris <a href="http://peaceinkurdistancampaign.wordpress.com/resources/pik-campaign-statements/outrage-as-kurds-held-up-for-hours-at-dover-crossing/">were detained for seven hours</a> at a Dover crossing, under the notorious <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/law/2013/aug/19/david-miranda-detention-schedule-7-terrorism-act">schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000</a>, which allows for detention and questioning on suspicion of terrorism without reasonable cause or access to the usual legal rights. The families were travelling to attend a demonstration to commemorate the assassination of three Kurdish activists in which the Turkish state is allegedly implicated. The significant effects of routine, everyday forms of arbitrary state interference are to disrupt collective, political life.</p>
<p>Proscription laws seek to disrupt the collective organisation of Kurdish people because they are understood to “legitimate” the PKKs political claims and, therefore, they can only be understood as supporting violence. More broadly, the proscription regime as it is constituted globally means that G8 states claiming democratic credentials create the conditions for state terror by less powerful nations. Proscription creates an international regime in which some states are empowered to use more repressive tactics against movements for self-determination. The British state, among other states who ban armed conflicts, deserves sustained attention for its role in depoliticising self-determination movements and legitimising and therefore extending state violence elsewhere.</p>
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<p><em>A conference in Liverpool on May 16 – <a href="http://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/civicrm/event/info?id=35">How Violent is Britain?</a>– will examine this issue in detail. This is part of a series of articles on this theme on The Conversation.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/25517/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vicki Sentas has received funding from the Berghof Foundation for Conflict Studies and the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust for the research project: 'Blacklists and the (de)criminalisation of conflict resolution'.</span></em></p>It is now accepted that the war on terror has generated an extensive repertoire of its very own terror. Drone strikes resulting in extrajudicial killings, rendition and torture – zones of exception like…Vicki Sentas, Lecturer in Law, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/255192014-05-09T05:32:50Z2014-05-09T05:32:50ZViolence in Britain: behind the wire at Immigration Removal Centres<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/48078/original/prvsxyzy-1399559120.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Yarl's Wood. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/78530">Oliver White/Geograph.org.uk</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Late in 2013 Lib Dem MP, Sarah Teather, <a href="http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201314/cmhansrd/cm131015/text/131015w0001.htm#131015w0001.htm_wqn65">challenged the government</a> to ensure that any reports into allegations of sexual assault at Yarl’s Wood detention centre compiled by private operators Serco are made public.</p>
<p>Teather’s demand followed a stream of allegations from former detainees that people held in detention had been subject to inappropriate sexual contact with staff. One woman claimed attempts were made to deport her within days of her informing Yarl’s Wood’s management of the incidents. She also said that one security guard had “inappropriate” relations with at least four women.</p>
<p>We need only scratch the surface of the asylum system in Britain to see that violence has become integral to the way we treat those seeking refuge. <a href="http://pun.sagepub.com/content/7/1/53.abstract">Detention</a> without criminal charge, <a href="http://www.irr.org.uk/news/public-spending-cuts-savage-dispersal-system/">dispersal</a>, <a href="http://www.jrct.org.uk/text.asp?section=0001000200030006">destitution</a>, and fear of deportation are central to the lives of those seeking asylum here. As recent reports indicate, violence against female refugees is often sexualised – <a href="http://www.refugeecouncil.org.uk/assets/0001/5837/Briefing_-_experiences_of_refugee_women_in_the_UK.pdf">including sexual abuse, sex trafficking, and so-called “transactional sex”</a>.</p>
<p>It has been an awkward few years for the Home Office and UK Border Agency (UKBA), which was <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-21941395">abolished in spring 2013</a>. UKBA was long berated by right-wing commentators who complained it did not keep enough immigrants out and failed to closely monitor those who did make it here – but human rights organisations have produced ample evidence that the British state’s methods of immigration control, including detention and dispersal, can seriously affect the mental and physical health of asylum seekers. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.irr.org.uk/news/another-preventable-death-in-immigration-detention/">The recent death of Christine Case</a> is the 14th death in an Immigration Removal Centre (IRC) in the past 10 years. Emma Mlotshwa, co-ordinator of the campaign group Medical Justice, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/mar/30/yarls-wood-immigration-centre-detainee-dies">responded by saying</a>: “The only thing we are surprised about is that there have not been more deaths.”</p>
<h2>Rendered vulnerable by the state</h2>
<p>In general, detained and incarcerated people can be made vulnerable to <a href="http://www.freedomfromtorture.org/sites/default/files/documents/rape_singles2.pdf">physical and sexual abuse</a>. Their vulnerability often arises from the unequal distribution of power between the incarcerated and those charged with securing them. Particular issues arise in holding women in detention, since women are disproportionately victims of sexual abuse in society more generally. These specifically include the potential for re-traumatisation based on earlier instances of sexual abuse and torture, and the threat of further sexual abuse.</p>
<p>Women for Refugee Women’s latest report, <a href="http://refugeewomen.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/WRWDetained.pdf">Detained</a>, found that of 46 female interviewees who had been held in detention in the UK, 33 had been raped in their home country. In its earlier 2012 report, <a href="http://www.refugeewomen.com/images/refused.pdf">Refused</a>, 66% of the women in the sample had experienced gender-based violence, and 32% of those women had previously been raped by soldiers, police or prison guards.</p>
<p>When I interview medical doctors, support workers or psychologists about the impacts of sexual violence on women seeking asylum, I often find a recognition that many women have left countries where sexual violence in detention is endemic, or where rape is widely used as a weapon of war – and from this, the assumption arises that they have made it to safety. As one interviewee once commented: “They don’t trust police or prison guards here because they don’t know it is different to their own country.”</p>
<p>After <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/sep/21/sexual-abuse-yarls-wood-immigration">allegations of sexual abuse</a> at Yarl’s Wood were made last year, the Home Office – as enforcer of border controls – was widely condemned over, but the outsourced management of the IRC to Serco allowed the government to put some distance between itself and the guards’ abuse.</p>
<p>Yet the government is not wholly innocent. Of course, there are individuals’ accountable for perpetrating sexual violence against women in Yarl’s Wood, and not all guards abuse their power in this way. Private security companies <a href="http://www.irr.org.uk/news/g4s-and-housing-abuse-of-asylum-seekers-the-truth-emerges/">have received criticism</a> for various other abuses. But it was government policy that allowed for women to be detained in situations that made them vulnerable to a specific kind of sexual violence. </p>
<h2>Wall of silence</h2>
<p>It was the Home Office that’s <a href="http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/clare-sambrook/uk-government-deports-sexual-assault-witnesses">first response</a> was not to gather evidence and move forward to hold those accountable, but to deport witnesses to their country of origin. It was the Home Office that moved to silence women survivors of, and witnesses to, sexual abuse.</p>
<p>Survivors of sexual violence are often faced with a wall of silence, be it through social stigma, shame or fear of reporting. Add to this a perpetrator who has the power to detain, restrain, search or report you, and who can exploit a fear of forced return to the country you have fled. It is a braver woman than I who stands up to this level of state power.</p>
<p>Women in Yarl’s Wood face indefinite detention, forced removal, use of restraint, roll call four times a day – and <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/02/detention-centre-shames-britain">the threat or use of sexual violence</a>. More broadly, and as already discussed, dispersal has been shown to impact on women’s safety in relation to trafficking, sexual exploitation, and even perinatal care.</p>
<p>Women who have fled domestic and/or sexual violence, conflict-related sexual abuse, female genital mutilation or so-called honour-based violence, live in fear of forced return to their country of origin and the persecution that they migrated from in the first place.</p>
<p>Thus, when we speak of state violence, or teach younger generations about violent governments and institutions, we should not limit our attention to other countries in other times. We need only look at our own government’s treatment of those seeking political or economic refuge – survivors of torture, sexual violence, and persecution – to see state power manifest as degrading, dehumanising violence.</p>
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<p><em>A conference in Liverpool on May 16 – <a href="http://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/civicrm/event/info?id=35">How Violent is Britain?</a>– will examine this issue in detail. This is part of a series of articles on this theme on The Conversation.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/25519/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Victoria Canning does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Late in 2013 Lib Dem MP, Sarah Teather, challenged the government to ensure that any reports into allegations of sexual assault at Yarl’s Wood detention centre compiled by private operators Serco are made…Victoria Canning, Senior Lecturer in Criminology, Liverpool John Moores UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/255182014-05-07T14:11:59Z2014-05-07T14:11:59ZPolice violence at anti-fracking protests is about order, not law<p>In November 2013 at Barton Moss on the outskirts of Salford, IGas, a company specialising in onshore extraction of oil and gas, began <a href="http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/igas-fracking-drills-arrive-salford-6343150">exploratory drilling</a> to test for coal bed methane and shale gas. The possibility of extracting the latter via hydraulic fracturing, better known as “fracking”, quickly became the focus of a local campaign. </p>
<p>A protest camp was built at the site of the well and remained in place throughout the IGas operation, ending in April 2014. Its residents, referring to themselves in many cases as “<a href="http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/content/barton-moss-anti-fracking-protest-camp-salford">protectors</a>” rather than protesters, aimed to disrupt the IGas operation by slow-marching trucks in and out of the site. This elicited a tough response from Greater Manchester Police (GMP), who have met the protest with a substantial police presence at almost every march and an increasing number of Tactical Aid Unit officers.</p>
<p>There have been more than <a href="http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/fracking-salford-solicitor-compiles-dossier-6874073">200 arrests to date</a> – including the detention of <a href="http://www.salfordstar.com/article.asp?id=2157">children</a> and both <a href="http://www.salfordstar.com/article.asp?id=2071">pregnant and elderly protesters</a> and the <a href="http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2284869/police_attack_barton_moss_antifracking_protestors.html">violent arrest of women</a> – alongside many additional reports of <a href="http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/police-watchdog-investigate-arrest-anti-fracking-6732583">police misconduct</a> related to <a href="http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2347997/barton_moss_who_is_policing_greater_manchester_police.html">GMP’s management of the protest</a>.</p>
<p>GMP’s aim has been to balance the rights of protesters with those of IGas; the chief constable has publicly expressed his frustration at being “<a href="http://www.gmp.police.uk/content/WebsitePages/6662DEE03DF784C680257C78003CF8A6?OpenDocument">stuck in the middle</a>”. However, those involved in the protests have described violent and intimidating policing tactics that have led many to question the police’s independence.</p>
<p>The use of violence in the policing of protest is nothing new in itself. What is both novel and disturbing is GMP officers’ apparent lack of restraint even in the face of <a href="http://stream.aljazeera.com/story/201401211238-0023408">live streaming</a> by camp residents and others involved in the marches, as well as close <a href="http://www.salfordstar.com/article.asp?id=2196">media attention</a>.</p>
<p>The GMP’s tactics have been met with concern by <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/jan/21/police-accused-brutality-anti-fracking-protester">legal observers</a>, journalists, <a href="http://www.manchestergreenparty.org.uk/news/2014-03-27-gmpcc-tony-lloyd-must-go.html">campaign groups</a> and local residents but have continued unabated. In recent weeks the number of arrests and the reports of police brutality have increased, leading the solicitor representing most of those arrested to state that the Tactical Aid UU officers appear “<a href="http://www.salfordstar.com/article.asp?id=2198">out of control</a>”.</p>
<p>While the various reports and videos shared online of police violence at Barton Moss suggest there has been a departure from “normal” policing, it is necessary to consider protest policing here and elsewhere in relation to the general function of police.</p>
<h2>Keeping the peace</h2>
<p>Liberal concepts of policing and the idea of “law and order” suggest that the police are identical with the law, both in terms of upholding it and in the regulation of their own conduct. But the history of policing (along with the contemporary experience of populations stigmatised by class, gender and race) tells us that police practices are designed to conform to and prioritise not law, but <a href="http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_fabrication_of_social_order.html?id=XzeFAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">order</a>.</p>
<p>Of course, this is not to suggest that appeals to the law aren’t central to the public representation of police and policing operations. At Barton Moss, GMP have continually <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R964M8pJlM0">reiterated their commitment to legal regulation</a> in relation to complaints, while at the same time challenging protesters’ claims of police violence – as well as blaming protesters for <a href="http://www.gmp.police.uk/content/WebsitePages/6662DEE03DF784C680257C78003CF8A6?OpenDocument">provoking</a> and <a href="http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/salford-fracking-protesters-intimidate-local-6554055">antagonising</a> officers.</p>
<p>It should not be surprising that police violence is often directed at populations who are viewed as a threat to order. That which we usually think of as “out of control” policing looks very different if we consider the role an “in control” police force plays in a capitalist society.</p>
<p>From this perspective, protest policing needs to be seen as a <a href="http://www.socialiststudies.com/index.php/sss/issue/view/21">pacification</a> project in which the suppression of a specific protest is not the sole objective. GMP’s response is clearly meant to ensure that IGas gets its shipment of trucks on a daily basis, and that the exploratory drilling at Barton Moss continues. But such brazen police violence in the face of media attention (social media or otherwise) sends a clear signal to those on the peripheries of the opposition – in the local community in Salford or those concerned about fracking around the country – that any protest against the operation of fracking is both illegitimate and dangerous.</p>
<p>In the words of <a href="http://www.salfordstar.com/article.asp?id=2202">one of the protesters</a>, the “violence, brutality, bullying and general intimidation” used by GMP have “created a climate of fear such that the British people feel unsafe to come forth and air their views”. Police violence, helped by its framing in a largely sympathetic media, enforces the compliance of protest movements and fuels the public’s fear of protesters.</p>
<p>In confronting the exploitation of natural resources (and highlighting the dangers involved therein) through direct action, fracking protesters are stepping outside of the incredibly narrow official understanding of legitimate “peaceful” (read: non-disruptive) protest and disrupting the wider social order, in which capitalism, sustained through a dependence on fossil fuels, is sealed off from any real alternatives.</p>
<p>The camp itself at Barton Moss is a clear sign of “disorder”, symbolising an opposition to <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jan/17/emails-uk-shale-gas-fracking-opposition">state-corporate collusion</a> in the economic exploitation of the natural environment.</p>
<p>Broadly speaking, most representations of police violence reduce it to the work of “bad apples”, acknowledging only that individual officers may have over-stepped the mark. The institutional and systemic violence that is, and has always been, at the core of the police project remains obscured.</p>
<p>Anti-fracking protests are an attempt to confront what Rob Nixon calls the <a href="http://chronicle.com/article/Slow-Violence/127968/">slow violence</a> of environmental damage; this attempt is in turn being countered by the violence of the state. We need to confront police violence with a broader critical approach to understanding both the destructive and productive effects of the structural and systematic violence through which the current social order is secured.</p>
<p>Protests that challenge the current social order and try to disrupt it will always be dealt with in this violent way. Calls for police restraint, or for accountability through official channels, will continue to fall on deaf ears. As David Cameron has said, “<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jan/13/shale-gas-fracking-cameron-all-out">We’re going all out for shale</a>.”</p>
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<p><em>A conference in Liverpool on May 16 – <a href="http://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/civicrm/event/info?id=35">How Violent is Britain?</a>– will examine this issue in detail. This is part of a series of articles on this theme on The Conversation.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/25518/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Will Jackson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In November 2013 at Barton Moss on the outskirts of Salford, IGas, a company specialising in onshore extraction of oil and gas, began exploratory drilling to test for coal bed methane and shale gas. The…Will Jackson, Lecturer in Social Sciences, Liverpool John Moores UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/256312014-04-24T05:12:49Z2014-04-24T05:12:49ZWe must do more to protect children in prison<p>The chief inspector of prisons has identified the single worst prison he has visited – and, scandalously, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/apr/23/brinsford-youth-offender-worst-jail-inspector-reformers">it’s a jail for children</a>. HMYOI Brinsford in Wolverhampton is filthy, squalid and has levels of violence and drug abuse that are three times greater than the prison’s target while the use of restraint and use of batons was “often disproportionate”.</p>
<p>According to the Howard League for Penal Reform, the child custody population for February 2014 was 1,183 of whom 54 were aged between 10 and 14 years of age. These are among society’s most vulnerable – and impressionable – people, yet their early experience of life is too easily tainted by fear and violence. </p>
<p>Just over a decade ago Paulo Sergio Pinheiro was appointed to direct the United Nations secretary-general’s study on violence against children – the most wide-ranging and detailed analysis of its type in history. <a href="http://www.unicef.org/lac/full_tex%283%29.pdf">The final report</a> which was published and presented to the United Nations General Assembly in November 2006 reaches a starkly depressing conclusion: violence against children is an endemic feature of the global landscape. Pinheiro had previously raised particular concerns about what he termed: “<a href="http://www.essex.ac.uk/armedcon/story_id/000280.pdf">the recurrent and banalised use of institutionalisation</a>”. </p>
<p>This casts a long shadow in England and Wales, where history is characterised by persistent failure, misery, scandal, human suffering, abuse and violence. The world of the child prison (not unlike the adult prison) is sharply stratified and is organised in accordance with both formal and informal hierarchies and pecking orders of power, control, intimidation and subordination. </p>
<p>Such stratification is both complex and fluid, creating a near-permanent sense of insecurity and uncertainty whereby child prisoners are routinely exposed to myriad forms of violence: physical; sexual; psychological; emotional and verbal (name-calling; threats; racist, sexist and homophobic taunting).</p>
<p>For all child prisoners, multiple and intersecting expressions of violence perpetuate fear, damage and harm. For some child prisoners the cumulative effects of such violence are too much to bear and <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/225104/safety-custody-mar-2013.pdf">self-harm is not uncommon</a>. In such cases the pains of confinement are relieved only on release. </p>
<p>For other child prisoners “release” takes a fatal form. Between 1990 and 2012, <a href="http://inquest.org.uk/publications/books/in-the-care-of-the-state-child-deaths-in-penal-custody-in-england-wales">33 children died in penal custody in England and Wales</a>, 31 in state prisons and two in private jails.</p>
<p>On one level, state agencies acknowledge the harmful and violent rhythms of penal regimes and, ultimately, the loss of 33 children’s lives. Numerous authoritative <a href="http://inquest.org.uk/publications/books/fatally-flawed">research reports</a>, <a href="http://www.hmcpsi.gov.uk/documents/reports/CJJI_THM/OFFM/Looked_After_Children_Thematic_Report_ENG.pdf">statutory inspections</a> , <a href="http://www.socialjusticejournal.org/?product=barry-goldson-2">academic publications</a>, <a href="HTTP://www.howardleague.org/restraint/">campaign initiatives</a>, televised documentaries, radio broadcasts and journalistic pieces have profiled such phenomena and, in this sense, it would be absurd to feign ignorance. But acknowledgement, such as it is, is conditioned and filtered. </p>
<p>The bald facts of the violence, violations, abuses, harms and, ultimately, deaths, are registered – but the wider contexts in which they are located, their true meanings and their full implications are, to paraphrase <a href="http://books.google.com.au/books/about/States_of_Denial.html?id=5UNrAnSC3d0C&redir_esc=y">Stan Cohen</a> not fully digested. They have “sunk into consciousness without producing shifts in policy or public opinion” or, just as significantly, without holding those responsible to account. In a deeper sense, therefore, the violence, even in its fatal form, is denied.</p>
<p>The tightly circumscribed nature of acknowledgement is such that, despite the <a href="http://www.prisonreformtrust.org.uk/Portals/0/Documents/Fatally%20Flawed.pdf">deaths of children in custody</a>, not a single independent public inquiry has been initiated. Indeed, the UK government and relevant state agencies have steadfastly resisted authoritative calls for a <a href="http://inquest.org.uk/publications/books/in-the-care-of-the-state-child-deaths-in-penal-custody-in-england-wales">transparent, comprehensive and truly independent inquiry</a> into child deaths in penal custody in England and Wales. </p>
<p>In February 2014, the <a href="http://www.justice.gov.uk/about/deaths-in-custody-independent-review">ministry of justice announced</a> that the Independent Advisory Panel (IAP) on Deaths in Custody is to be tasked with reviewing – within narrow terms of reference – self-inflicted deaths of 18-24 year olds in penal custody. Child deaths are omitted from the “review” and will seemingly remain, officially at least, largely ignored within a culture of British state violence in which impunity and lack of accountability will continue to prevail.</p>
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<p><em>A conference in Liverpool on May 16 – <a href="http://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/civicrm/event/info?id=35">How Violent is Britain?</a> – will examine this issue in detail. This is part of a series of articles on this theme on The Conversation.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/25631/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Barry Goldson has received funding from various research grant-making agencies but no funding is directly related to this short article..</span></em></p>The chief inspector of prisons has identified the single worst prison he has visited – and, scandalously, it’s a jail for children. HMYOI Brinsford in Wolverhampton is filthy, squalid and has levels of…Barry Goldson, Charles Booth Chair of Social Science, University of LiverpoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.