England in the eye of riots

Last Saturday, riots broke out in the London suburb of Tottenham. They later spread to other areas within London. By Monday night, the conflagration had spread to inner-city areas in Birmingham and Liverpool. On Tuesday night the violence was less widespread. Nevertheless there was sporadic violence in Birmingham, West Bromwich, Manchester and Wolverhampton. In Nottingham, three Police stations were attacked.

The immediate trigger for the rioting was the shooting by the Metropolitan Police, in suspicious circumstances of a young man, Mark Duggan in Tottenham.

Martin Luther King

The Police claimed that Duggan had opened fire on them. However, the Independent Police Complaints Commission later found that there was no evidence that he had in fact done so. Duggan’s family and friends, who gathered to get answers were kept waiting for hours and one of their number was apparently assaulted by the Police. It was at this point that rioting started.

The wider cause of the disturbances was the systematic harassment of poor youth (mainly non-white) by the Police. Blacks are five times more likely to be stopped and searched than white people.

They are also six times more likely to be arrested for drug-related offenses, although there is no evidence of higher drug-related criminal activity by non-whites.

Prevention of Terrorism Act

Evidence was found of Police racism by a study carried out by a Police inspection report in 1997. Around the same time, black people were three times more likely than white to be stopped under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). Asians were 13 percent more likely to be stopped.

The PTA had been introduced specifically to combat terrorism by Irish republican groups, so hardly any Black or Asian people should have been stopped at all. The street battles between working-class youth and the Police were accompanied by looting. Most of the goods stolen were clothes and consumer durables with envy-value.

The larceny seems to have been carried out by different people than those confronting the Police. They seem to have moved in opportunistically, mobilised by Facebook, Twitter and BlackBerry Messenger.

Underlying both the violence and the looting is the decay in British urban society. The increasing differential between the urban poor and the rich is mirrored by the rising gap between expectations and the reality of existence.

Housing and social infrastructure

The collapse of Britain’s industry left many inner-city areas blighted by unemployment, with poor housing and social infrastructure. They were socially alienated from more prosperous suburbs. Urban regeneration spending has declined, and renewal schemes have not reached the targeted people.

Riot Police confronting youths in London with widespread violence being reported in the UK after last Saturday’s shooting. Pic. courtesy: Google

The abandonment of the Welfare State, with its aim of caring for all, left the most vulnerable stranded. Successive governments have been weakening the social safety nets which could have caught the disadvantaged. The inequality between the rich and the poor in Britain is at its highest since the early 60s. The top 10 percent of the population now holds 53 percent of Britain’s wealth, while the poorest 50 percent have just seven percent. Meanwhile, 15 percent of schoolchildren are found to come from deprived backgrounds.

Advertising and media hype have made ‘lifestyle’ a fashion accessory. It de rigueur to wear the trendiest kits, to possess the most up-to-the-minute white goods and to flaunt the latest handheld devices. The youth of the poorer classes desire these goods and the status they bring. Yet they are increasingly less able to acquire them. Unemployment is rising and is chronic in the inner-city areas where the poor live.

Even the right-wing Daily telegraph acknowledges these deeper reasons for the riots. Columnist Mary Riddle writes that ‘Britain is less equal, in wages, wealth and life chances’ than at any time after the Great Depression. She identifies the rioters among the ‘lost generation’.

Urban communities

‘If there are no jobs for today’s malcontents’ she writes, ‘and no means to exploit their skills, then the UK is in graver trouble than it thinks.’ She feels that the only solution is ‘social democracy, with its safety nets, costly education and healthcare for all.’ Riddle also refers to the ‘vote-losing underclass that politicians ignore at their peril, and at ours.’ The poor, the bottom third of the population, do not have the political clout of the better-off middle class voters - the ones who are wooed by the political elite.

The American civil rights leader Martin Luther King once said that ‘a riot is the language of the unheard.’ Britain’s unheard certainly gave voice over the weekend. NBC asked a youth in Tottenham if anything was achieved by rioting and he replied: ‘Yes, you wouldn’t be talking to me now if we didn’t riot, would you? Two months ago we marched to Scotland Yard, more than 2,000 of us, all blacks, and it was peaceful and calm and you know what? Not a word in the press. Last night, a bit of rioting and looting and look around you.’ And the political elite have, belatedly, started listening. The head of Britain’s urban regeneration programme, Jackie Sadek, asked that there be no knee-jerk reaction to the riots. She said that people in urban communities should be placed at the heart of renewal efforts.

The attitude of the politicians is changing as the truth dawns on them. On the day the rioting started, London Mayor Boris Johnson refused to cut short his holiday to come back and deal with the situation. He breathed venom at the rioters, calling them criminals.

Three days later, having cut short his holiday and returned, Johnson burst out at a citizen that ‘It is time that people who are engaged in looting and violence stopped hearing economic and sociological justifications for what they...’ Later however, he was a little more circumspect. ‘We will redouble our efforts’, he said, ‘to deal with the root causes of the alienation of young people.’