Introduction: Understanding Riots

Abstract

The past 10 years have been marked by a series of high profile and heavily mediatised riots across the globe. The earliest major example occurred in autumn 2005, when France witnessed 3 weeks of nationwide rioting following the deaths of two youths in the infamous banlieues, the underprivileged suburbs at the fringes of major French cities. The latest example was in April 2015, when the death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray in police custody led to large-scale disorder in Baltimore, a city in the US state of Maryland. The intensity of these riots prompted the mayor of Baltimore to declare a state of emergency and saw some 4000 National Guard troops deployed throughout the city. These examples are notable but not isolated incidents. Other high-profile riots have occurred in Australia (2005), Greece (2008), England (2011), Sweden (2013), and the USA (2014). From the overspill of racial tensions in Sydney to anti-police riots in London, democratic societies have, in recent years, witnessed powerful and costly outbursts of anger and violence. Not surprisingly, these developments have renewed interest in the nature, significance, and causes of collective disorder, both in terms of public perceptions and the political response to riots, and in terms of academic debate on how these phenomena should be theorised and understood.