Policing Protest: The Post-Democratic State and the Figure of Black Insurrection (Global and Insurgent Legalities)

In Policing Protest Paul A. Passavant explores how the policing of protest in the United States has become increasingly hostile since the late 1990s, moving away from strategies that protect protesters toward militaristic practices designed to suppress protests. He identifies reactions to three interrelated crises that converged to institutionalize this new mode of policing: the political mobilization of marginalized social groups in the Civil Rights era that led to a perceived crisis of democracy, the urban fiscal crisis of the 1970s, and a crime crisis that was associated with protests and civil disobedience of the 1960s. As Passavant demonstrates, these reactions are all haunted by the figure of black insurrection, which continues to shape policing of protest and surveillance, notably in response to the Black Lives Matter movement. Ultimately, Passavant argues, this trend of violent policing strategies against protesters is evidence of the emergence of a post-democratic state in the United States. "Policing Protest explores how protest policing has become more hostile to protesters and how this hostility expresses a post-democratic state formation persistently haunted by the figure of black insurrection. Beginning in the late 1990s, a more violent style of protest policing took shape in the United States. This style of protest policing both criminalizes protest, and reacts to protests with increasing militarism where police fail to prevent or disorganize political mobilization critical of growing inequality and authoritarianism. "Security" is the protest policing arm of a distinctively post-democratic, post-legitimation state formation: neoliberal authoritarianism. This shift to protest policing that is more hostile to protesters is the result of reactions to three inter-related crises of the 1960s and 1970s: a crisis of democracy, the urban fiscal crisis, and the "crime" crisis. The institutional processes set in motion by these reactions converged by the late 1990s to create a more aggressive and violent style of policing protest. Each of these crisis reactions is haunted by the figure of Black insurrection, and this model of policing protest is particularly exemplified in the policing of #BlackLivesMatter protests"-- Provided by publisher "Paul A. Passavant explores how the policing of protest in the United States has become increasingly hostile since the late 1990s, moving away from strategies that protect protestors toward militaristic practices designed to suppress legal protests."-- Provided by publisher