Complexity and Social Movements: Multitudes at the Edge of Chaos ...

May Day 2001 – the devil incarnate?
States fight back 79
As May Day 2001 approached media reports emphasised impending violence
with The Sunday Telegraph reporting:
more than 15,000 dedicated, hardened activists from all over Europe
[who] will descend on just one target, central London. . . . Among the
anarchists who are likely to attend are those from the Black Flag movement
and German terrorists. These are the same people who caused
trouble at the meeting of the G8 group of economic powers . . . at Seattle
(18.02.01)
Such accounts were reproduced across the spectrum of print media (see
The Observer 29.04.01). Photographs of suspected ringleaders ‘intending’
to cause violence were circulated to the press during April 2001 (Vidal and
Branigan 2001), despite none having been identified as offenders.
Newspaper accounts intoned that anarchists were thousands strong, would
carry samurai swords, had links with the Real IRA, had been to training
camps in United States, and were ‘battle hard’. Political figures including
the Mayor of London, Ken Livingston warned protesters to stay at home
and backed the police in arresting anyone whose intention was ‘to engage
in criminal activities’ (Vidal and Branigan 2001). Tony Blair considered that:
The limits are passed when protesters, in the name of some spurious
cause, seek to inflict fear, terror, violence and criminal damage on people
and property....There is a right way to protest in a democracy and there
is a wrong way. Britain and its people are not just tolerant of peaceful
protest but see it, rightly, as part of our democratic process.
(The Guardian 1.05.01)
The Guardian, reported that ‘more than 100 often hysterical articles have
been printed in the mainstream press hyping the violence, with few suggesting
that the protesters have any valid point. The unbalance has been
remarkable. No one wants to look at why people are protesting (Vidal and
Branigan 2001).
Given the expectation of violence the police adopted a ‘zero tolerance’
stance, mobilising 6,000 officers with a further 3,000 in reserve (The
Independent 2.05.01). Predictions of a large protest committed to violence
were confounded when only 3,000 to 5,000 turned out to participate in a
fluid action that envisaged carnivalesque events in areas of London associated
with the board game Monopoly. The policing operation was clearly
intended to maintain control of the streets and limit mobility and resulted
in protestors being ‘kettled’ in Oxford Circus. The police cordon was
strictly maintained for over six hours during which no one was permitted
to leave without being photographed and giving their personal details.
Some small skirmishes broke out as water, food and personal comfort all