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The confrontational stance of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) against the Civil Rights Movement (CRM) was a central factor in the outbreak of political violence in Northern Ireland in the late 1960s. The analysis of the RUC officers’ testimonies before the Scarman Tribunal of Inquiry discloses both the police knowledge and the pattern of interaction between police and protesters. The closed political opportunity structure (POS) for the CRM filtered in the police knowledge, proving it to be a thorough indicator of the state's prevailing strategy towards challengers. Yet, even within a state firmly intolerant of mass dissent police can occasionally decide to cooperate with protesters. In Derry, the RUC was often willing to, and in fact did, negotiate with protest leaders, showing at times a remarkably flexible approach. However, the negotiations occurred haphazardly outside institutional channels, with unpredictable outcomes. Consequently, protest-policing styles failed to soften and conflicts to deescalate.

Inquiries, commissions, reviews and the promise of broader data collection about racial and gender disparities are now the reflex defensive responses from state institutions charged with grievous social harm, particularly in the UK. Recommendations from these exercises are rarely implemented. As criminologists, our ability to produce and analyse data that evidences or better illuminates social harm has long been a key offer of the discipline to activism.

How are we to respond to the very institutions activist criminologists seek to challenge immediately offering this very activity, invariably protracted and ineffectual, as a reflex response to activist challenge? This chapter explores this tension. Grounded in the work of groups struggling to end police stop and search, it considers the strategy impasse around research and data production that faces grassroots activists and their accomplice researchers. The chapter proposes new routes for collaboration and action across activist and criminologist communities that may help move past the ‘data trap’. In short, it seeks to answer: do activists need more evidence?

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the disorders that occurred in Manchester in 1981 and 2011 with the aim of comparing the similarities and differences that have been put forward to explain why these events occurred. The paper further seeks to evaluate the tactics that might be used in future years to police disaffected communities.

The research for this paper is library‐based, making considerable use of primary sources that relate to events in 1981 and 2011. The objectives of this research are addressed by examining a number of key themes: the 1981 Moss Side riot: explanations for the 1981 Moss Side riot: the 2011 riots in Greater Manchester: explanations of the causes of the 2011 riots in Manchester: the future policing of disaffected communities in Manchester.

The research established that although there were many similarities in the events that occurred in 1981 and 2011, there were also important differences that reflect social, economic and cultural changes that have affected society since 1981. It also rejects the opinion that a more aggressive style of policing is the only way to police disaffected communities to prevent a repetition of events that took place in 2011.

The research suggests that the way forward for the policing of disaffected communities lies in an approach that seeks to engage hearts and minds rather than one that aims to quell dissent through coercive methods.

The paper presents an original comparison of events that took place in one area of Britain in 1981 and 2011. The interpretation of material relating to the causes of rioting and future policing policies is informed by both academic and practitioner perspectives.

The cardinal point to note here is that the development (and unfortunately the likely potential) of area policy is intimately related to the actual character of British social policy. Whilst area policy has been strongly influenced by Pigou's welfare economics, by the rise of scientific management in the delivery of social services (cf Jaques 1976; Whittington and Bellamy 1979), by the accompanying development of operational analyses and by the creation of social economics (see Pigou 1938; Sandford 1977), social policy continues to be enmeshed with the flavours of Benthamite utilitatianism and Social Darwinism (see, above all, the Beveridge Report 1942; Booth 1889; Rowntree 1922, 1946; Webb 1926). Consequently, for their entire history area policies have been coloured by the principles of a national minimum for the many and giving poorer areas a hand up, rather than a hand out. The preceived need to save money (C.S.E. State Apparatus and Expenditure Group 1979; Klein 1974) and the (supposed) ennobling effects of self help have been the twin marching orders for area policy for decades. Private industry is inadvertently called upon to plug the resulting gaps in public provision. The conjunction of a reluctant state and a meandering private sector has fashioned the decaying urban areas of today. Whilst a large degree of party politics and commitment has characterised the general debate over the removal of poverty (Holman 1973; MacGregor 1981), this has for the most part bypassed the ‘marginal’ poorer areas (cf Green forthcoming). Their inhabitants are not usually numerically significant enough to sway general, party policies (cf Boulding 1967) and the problems of most notably the inner cities has been underplayed.

Describes ways to ensure police involvement in schools works. Considers a typical first contact between the police and young people and the developments following the Scarman Report in 1982 leading to policing in the community. Reflects on the role of the police as educators and their deficiencies in meeting that position. Believes an approach that aims to be educational, empowering, co‐operative and user friendly, produces the best response and illustrates this by devising materials for use by the police in their community work in schools.

This paper commences with the recognition that so‐called zero tolerance policing strategies have been implemented and sustained ‐ both in the USA and Britain ‐ in response to a very widespread public demand. It is argued that dismissing this support as part of a reactionary political backlash fails to address some very legitimate public concerns. Consequently, this paper considers the socio‐political circumstances that have provided the conditions for this popular support in terms of the notion of postmodern politics, whereby political demands and subsequent strategies are introduced that appeal to a wide range of interest groups, and which cross over the traditional liberal/conservative divide. Examples are cited, from New York City in the USA, to various geographical locations in Britain, in order to support the argument that zero tolerance‐style policing needs to be driven by the concerns of the particular community in order to receive widespread legitimacy.

In deeply divided societies such as Northern Ireland the question of police reform cannot be divorced from broader political issues. This article looks at the connections between police reform and the political process, in the particular context of the recommendations of the Patten Report, which put forward a framework for a fundamental reform of policing in Northern Ireland. The problems encountered during the subsequent reform process – both political and institutional – are discussed. It is argued that the model of a decentralized and democratically accountable police service, based on the core principle of community policing, although not fully realized, offers a model for policing in societies which are becoming increasingly multi‐ethnic.

The majority of New Commonwealth immigrants to Britain arrived during the 1950s and early 1960s but for them and their children, equal opportunities are not yet a reality. To understand why this is so, requires some background on the establishment of a multi‐racial society in Britain.

The shortcoming of secret ballots, as with any other kind of opinion poll, is that people may choose not to believe them. Indeed, where important industrial relations issues are at stake, parties to a dispute may go to great lengths to try and prove the invalidity of an unpalatable result.

Social policy in the UK has subsumed race inequality into a wider framework of inequalities, managing diversity and social exclusion. However, the David Bennett Inquiry and the Race Relations Amendment Act (2000) have placed ‘race’ firmly back onto the policy agenda, particularly within mental health services. In response to the Inquiry and as part of a wider strategy, the Department of Health has set out proposals to improve mental health services to black and minority ethnic (BME) communities. Although there is a long history of race equality training to address race inequality in public services in the UK, the definition and effectiveness of race equality training remains unclear.This paper presents an overview of approaches to training in the UK, the evidence of effectiveness and explores whether cultural competency is an appropriate and adequate framework to address race inequality.