The Problems of Parliament Square
Ok, so given there’s a lot of shouting going on at the moment I thought I’d put this up here. I had a piece published in LibCon today which was relatively heavily edited by Sunny. Fair enough – it’s his blog. I do think my position was rather misrepresented but have done my best in the comments to clarify, nonetheless I am still coming under attack from people who think that I’m against protest in general. So here’s the text I sent Sunny. You can decide for yourselves if you think he’s altered my position.
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We already know the story too well: mass protests in Parliament Square inevitably end up with everyone being kettled until 11pm, violent confrontations with the police in which activists get beaten up or more seriously hurt, and plenty of arrests to boot. Every indication in the press has been that the reaction from the police and the state towards future student protests will be stronger and more violent than it has been. The left are not to blame for the brutal police tactics, they are not guilty of kettling anyone, and they are not responsible for arrests. Nonetheless they are responsible for unnecessarily putting people in situations where these things inevitably happen.
The Government has escalated its legal reaction to protest. At the first demonstrations arrests were made for anti-social behaviour. By November 30th over 150 students (mainly FE students) were arrested for breach of the peace in Trafalgar Square. By December 10th, the charges being handed out were violent disorder (a serious offence with a maximum jail term of 5 years.) This is the offence that many young people were prosecuted for in January 2009 during the protests around the war on Gaza. Some are still in prison. Detective Chief Superintendent Matthew Horne, heading the Operation Malone (student protests) team, said on Thursday,”We saw, this week, a young man with no criminal history sentenced to a substantial term of imprisonment for throwing a fire extinguisher off the roof of Millbank Tower. … I would urge those intent on committing violence and damage to reflect upon this.”
The organized left have a role to play in protecting activists from these heightened state offensives. Unfortunately this role is not yet being taken seriously enough. In the coming weeks there are three demonstrations called: two to try to save the Educational Maintenance Allowance (19th and 26th of January) and one around university fees and cuts (29th January.) All of them hope to end up in Parliament Square. Almost all of the factions are complicit: SWP, Counterfire, AWL, Workers Power, Revolution, and the Socialist Party.
If anything threatens to blot out our political message, it’s the continual violent confrontations with the police. These are, of course, inevitable, but we can attempt to minimize them. The police are in many cases a legitimate target, not least when they are containing protesters or lashing out violently, but by protesting in Parliament Square we make these confrontations inevitable. Some people in the movement are saying that we really need a “good symbolic endpoint” for a demonstration. As if a demonstration not at Parliament wouldn’t get our message across. They apparently believe that this need is strong enough to justify losing the political message, losing support, and getting protesters injured, and arrested. The area from Trafalgar Square to Parliament Square was designed to control mass protests, and we should not become complicit with this architecture. We must protest elsewhere
The really sad thing, though, is that these people push forward these decisions on the routes of marches are rarely the ones who get arrested and beaten up. Somehow the self-proclaimed student leaders seem to always end up in the pub before the final kettle. Those who get arrested are more often than not working-class FE students who need more, not less, protection from the state than experienced activists. If the organized left are going to drag young people into these dangerous situations the very least they should be doing is sticking around to help them out, to stay within the kettle to provide support and advice gained over years of protest. Some activists are already doing this in the form of the Green and Black Cross but the organized left are yet to start participating, rather they are happier to provide an army of stewards who send people back into dangerous situations (something that resulted in 150 arrests on November 30) without dealing with the consequences.
Reader Comments
Why are you letting someone edit your work to the extent that you think your position is being misrepresented? For the sake of some extra readers?
Don’t sell yourself short please.
Oliver, see my last comment on LibCon.
Yes, the Hundal edit can be rather a problem.
Be grateful you’ve just had your argument misrepresented. I’ve had my posts turned into complete and total gibberish:
http://liberalconspiracy.org/2010/09/15/police-chief-fights-the-cuts-by-threatening-protesters/
vs the original
http://badconscience.com/2010/09/14/idiot-thug/
I think Sunny is often overly-focused on producing very short, very punchy blogs. It helps the readership, see. But often I feel he becomes overly-focused on this, and reduces the quality and nuance of articles by trying to fit them into 450 straitjackets.
There’s no doubt that often I am too wordy and need a good editor. But sometimes I feel Sunny edits things far too quickly (i.e. lingering obvious mistakes can be found) and without sensitivity to the complexity of other people’s arguments.
I should probably say this to him directly, but, erm, I never get around to it…
*”450 /word/ straitjackets”, obviously,
I think you’ve made the right decision to move the post back over here. That wasn’t minor editing. It completely changed the nature of your argument, from one about tactics, to one that is actively against direct action and disruption. While the updated version has been posted now, it’s unfortunately taken the debate in a completely different direction to what you intended. To respond to some of your (actual) points.
If anything threatens to blot out our political message, it’s the continual violent confrontations with the police. These are, of course, inevitable, but we can attempt to minimize them.
If it’s inevitable, I’m not convinced it’s that much of a tactical consideration on its own. Realistically, any demo, let alone direct action, is going to come in conflict with the cops in the present political climate. And it hasn’t really blotted out our political message so far anyway. If anything, it’s given the issues more prominence in the public eye. It’s also worth being clear about what you mean by “violence”. As the LibCon debacle shows, there are some that will include property damage, even when it’s incidental like with occupations. That includes some on the right of the anti-cuts campaign. I suspect that’s not your position.
The area from Trafalgar Square to Parliament Square was designed to control mass protests, and we should not become complicit with this architecture. We must protest elsewhere
But I agree with this completely. We need tactical flexibility. To look at a past demonstration, Mayday Monopoly was successful for precisely that reason. I wouldn’t necessarily rule out Trafalgar Square/Parliament Square entirely for future demonstrations, but neither do I think it should be assumed. There’s also the question of why every “national mobilisation’ has to happen in London in the first place. I’d also suggest that, particuarly with the current “kettle them all” tactic the police are using, I see no reason why we should also agree a march route with them beforehand.
Another question is the date of marches. Might be worth actually having them when police resources are likely to be stretched. Local football derbys. Or, if we want to put the cat among the pigeons, the royal wedding. And Thatcher’s state funeral.
If the organized left are going to drag young people into these dangerous situations the very least they should be doing is sticking around to help them out, to stay within the kettle to provide support and advice gained over years of protest. Some activists are already doing this in the form of the Green and Black Cross but the organized left are yet to start participating
There’s also Anarchist Black Cross, but yes. The last century left are utterly terrible at prisoner support work. Quite honestly, the earth first/animal liberation types are miles ahead the rest of us on this. Sadly, I’m too cynical to see this changing much. It’s been an issue for years, with very little sign of progress.
rather they are happier to provide an army of stewards who send people back into dangerous situations (something that resulted in 150 arrests on November 30) without dealing with the consequences.
That strikes me a bit inaccurate from my own experiences. The standard complaint is that the official stewards try to stop direct action. While that didn’t happen on Nov 30, I got the distinct impression that the stewards were completely taken aback by the militancy of the demo.
I do think it’s worth looking at whether we need a different kind of steward. Officially or not, a group of people that defends the demo against police attack and/or tries to get people out the kettle.
The editing is obviously terrible, but why post on Lib Con in the first place? None of the people you presumably want to have this argument with – the organised left – are likely to be hanging round there.
And worse, given the recent verging-on-mental Trot-bashing that’s been going on there, your article just comes off as another kicking – hardly conducive to having a serious political conversation.
Well that is certainly better than the Liberal Conspiracy edit , but there are still , to my mind, two big problems here.
Firstly, I don’t think you realise how your “pied piper” arguments about the ‘leadership’ calling for the demonstrations then doing the “what a catalyst you turned out to be / loaded the guns and then went off home for your tea” act is actually pretty offensive. People have got themselves elected and made public calls for action, they have done a terrific job and don’t need your accusations of hypocrisy.
Secondly, I think there is a good case for sometimes using more imaginative protest routes/forms to get high profile /cause disruption. But you need to be aware of two things (1) You can end up with smaller protests by following these less conventional demonstration routes /times- it can be a bit of a trade-off (it can be a trade off worth making, but something worth considering) and (2) While alternative demonstration tactics can certainly be justified from the point of view of adding variety to the protests, keeping the momentum up through new tactics, broadening the protests etc., It is a fantasy to think that surprising , non-Trafalgar square type demos mean you can escape the accusations of violence being made against the protestors and the police kettling . There are some very recent examples of this – most obviously May Day 2001, which was a pretty “fluffy” demo and had a whole series of eye catching and avoid-the-police- tactics, but that didn’t stop the mad stories about anarchists with samurai swords in the press in the run up , or the eventual kettle at Oxford Circus. But equally, even with the kettling / accusations of violence etc. both May Day 2001 and the recent student demonstrations were , on the whole, successes.