Theoretical analysis of crowd psychology and non-violent crowd management (original) (raw)
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The role of crowd theory in determining the use of force in public order policing
Social psychological research suggests that where police hold a theoretical view of the crowd in line with the 'classic' crowd psychology of Gustavé Le Bon this can lead to police practices that inadvertently escalate public disorder. This research reflects debates within the criminology literature which suggests that a primary factor governing police tactics is police knowledge. However, the existing research on the specific relationships between police theoretical knowledge of crowds and their practice towards them is limited by its reliance on post hoc data. This paper addresses this limitation by examining the role of police theoretical view of crowd psychology and their operational practice during a high risk football crowd event. The analysis supports the argument that when the police hold a view of the crowd as inherently irrational and dangerous they rely upon tactics of mass containment and dispersal. This study advances the literature by suggesting that this 'classic' theoretical view of the crowd is leading to missed opportunities for the police to develop more efficient, effective and less confrontational approaches to the management of public order during crowd events.
The topic of crowd psychology has been at times central to the sub-discipline of social psychology, and at other times marginal. Its relative prominence in textbooks and curricula has partly reflected the extent to which ‘the crowd’ is seen as a social problem in the wider society. So-called ‘crowd science’ first emerged in the late nineteenth century France as a response to the perceived threat of ‘the mob’ to order and indeed to civilization itself. Today, ‘crowd psychology’ or ‘crowd behaviour’ typically refers to the topic of conflict in crowds, the problematic defined by this first wave of theory. However, there are other areas of research and theory that fall under the heading of crowd psychology, more broadly conceived. One is the study of behaviour in mass emergencies. Another is the study of the effects of crowding. Sociological accounts of crowd behaviour have also been put forward. Indeed from the outset there has been discussion ... [read more]
Collective human behaviour such as manifesting itself in crowd behaviour is complex and need to be studied to gain insight into group behaviour. The aim of this study is to provide a general orientation to crowd psychology as a basis for crowd control within the South African National Defence Force. This study starts with the clarification of concepts relevant to crowd psychology. This is followed by an introductory discussion to collective behaviour and the dynamics of crowds, with specific reference to types of crowds, leadership in crowds, crowd dynamics, the social political context of crowds and the physical context of crowd behaviour. Furthermore, crowd management is discussed by firstly referring to the tactics used by crowds, then focusing on the individual, followed by a framework that military commanders can use in negotiations, the principles of crowd control and, finally a brief reference to training in crowd control.
From the Arab Spring and Occupy to the London riots and student tuition fee protests, the disordered crowd has reemerged as a focal point of anxiety for law-makers. The article examines two recent cases where the UK courts have thought about crowds: In Austin the House of Lords connected the crowd to an idea of human nature. This essentialist rendering placed the crowd within an old analytic register where it is understood to release a primordial violence. In Bauer the Administrative Court utilised a very different sense of the ‘crowdness’ of the crowd to uphold the conviction of UK Uncut activists for aggravated trespass. These two mutually exclusive senses of the crowd are interesting not because they require synthesis, but because they reveal a deeper question of the relation between the judicial-administrative rationality of rights and the police rationality of management, or between principle and strategy. This is the fundamental tension of the ‘Law of Crowds’.
BA(Hons) Final Dissertation, 2016
Abstract “How the psychology of crowd behaviour impacts on operational resilience.” This is a report prepared from a literature search together with research using expert theorists and practitioners. The report investigates the changing demographics and behaviours of crowds when subjected to stressful emergency situations and how this affects the operational resilience for Event Safety organisations. This study has set out to examine the history of psychological research on crowd processes, to unpack the plethora of theory and research to understand the patterns of crowd actions and individual behaviours. There is still a tendency to focus on early scientific theorists such as Gustave Le Bon’s research (Le Bon 1895), which separates crowds from their social context. His theory assumed that crowd participation counters our normal view of psychological behaviours, revealing a primitive and uncontrolled behaviour (Reicher, 1996 Reicher and Potter, 1985). Stephen Reicher (Reicher 1982,1987) argues that ‘one of the more remarkable features of traditional crowd psychology is that it has tended to constitute a theory without a referent. Rather than starting from a set of phenomena that are in need of explanation, a set of explanations were elaborated in order to underpin certain ideological presuppositions about the crowd - or at least the suppositions of gentleman observers who viewed the masses with alarm from the outside’. Crowds should not be seen as aggressive and uncontrollable in emergency situations but with patterns and behaviours that reflect social and cultural influences. There are a number of social scientists that now support this view (Krantz, 1988, Turner and Killian 1964, Williams, 1986, Reicher, Drury, Stott, 1996, 1997, 1999), arrived at after relevant scientific research to investigate patterns of crowd behaviour to show that there are observable trends that reflect existing cultures and social identity.
Crowd Psychology, Public order police training and the policing of football crowds
Purpose -This study seeks to examine what theory of crowd psychology is being applied within public order police training in England and Wales and what accounts of crowds, police strategies and tactics subsequently emerge among officers who undertake this training. Design/methodology/approach -The study uses a multi-method approach including observations of public order training courses, interviews with students and instructors, and the dissemination of questionnaires. Findings -The analysis suggests that a form of crowd theory associated with the work of Gustave Le Bon has become institutionalised within police training. This in turn is leading to a potentially counter-productive reliance on the undifferentiated use of force when policing crowds. Practical implications -The study illustrates that such training outcomes not only are counter to the recent developments in evidence, theory and policy but also undermine the police's ability to develop more efficient and effective approaches to policing crowds. Originality/value -The study provides a systematic review of public order training which demonstrates how crowd theory is used as a rationale and justification for the use of tactics based on undifferentiated force. It makes suggestions for improving police training so that updates in policy and theory can be translated into operational practice.
Multitudes Gather: An Overview and Analysis of the Evolution of Research Concerning Crowd Behavior
Jccc Honors Journal, 2015
Crowds oftentimes behave in ways that are considered abnormal. This study sought to understand why crowds behave so differently from individuals acting alone. This was accomplished by tracing the evolution of research regarding crowd behavior from its beginnings within the nations of France and Italy in the late 19 th century all the way to contemporary time. Crowds were defined as psychological occurrences and categorized according to the research of Roger Brown and Neil Smelser. In order to explain theory regarding crowd behavior, this study focused on the research conducted by Le Bon, Festigener, Pepitone, Newcomb, Zimbardo, Diener, Prentice-Dunn, and Rogers. The research of all of these individuals together evolved from its focus on the existence of a collective mind within crowds into the classic de-individuation theory and later into the contemporary de-individuation theory. Crowd behavior is seen as being caused by a complex web of variables driven by the environment and situation of the time. Research regarding crowd behavior is continually evolving.
Policing Protests (RIOTS): An Investigation and Analysis of Crowd Management Strategies
International Journal of Innovative Science and Research Technology , 2022
This article presents a literature overview which probes police and operational policies, relevant legislation and crowd management guidelines, in an effort to pinpoint popular modern protest management practices in South Africa. The study adopts a discursive framework, with information gathered, categorized, plotted, critically considered and a line of reasoning developed. In order to verify the current status of Public Order Police(POP) in South Africa, a thorough study of all relevant legislature and working guidelines (including National Instructions, Standing Orders, SAPS strategic plans, etc.) has been piloted and the implications of these instruction documents examined. Firstly, notwithstanding the paucity of studies on service delivery complaints conducted or published between 1994 and 2000, this study shows a significant disparity among complaint management policies used within the trial organizations. Secondly, the studies that are available are narrative analyses of rally events and are not grounded in any hypothetical ideals or investigative philosophy. The author believes that this article will play an important role in shaping future government theory and therefore practices, and in contributing to an empirical measure of dissent. This will be of applied benefit to decision-makers at all levels.
The psychology of collective action: Crowds and change.
Crowd events are sites of both social determination and social-psychological change. On the one hand, the form of crowd behavior is a function of the culturally and historically given norms and values of crowd participants. On the other hand, crowd events can be psychologically and socially transformative: they can change the very culture from which they took their meaning. In this chapter we argue that most models of crowd behavior deny and hence are incapable of explaining either social determination or change. We describe the elaborated social identity model (ESIM) of crowd action, which we suggest has at its core a concept of self or identity adequate to explaining the dynamics of cultural reproduction and change in crowd events.
Toward Better Management of Potentially Hostile Crowds
2021 Winter Simulation Conference (WSC), 2021
The U.S. Capitol protest and siege in January 2021 provides a vivid demonstration of the challenges posed by managing potentially hostile crowds. Individuals in these crowds are organized into identity groups. Crowd participants' emotions, beliefs, objectives and group affiliations are dynamic. Security forces managing such crowds are tasked with the weighty decisions of tactical rules-of-engagement and choice of weapons. We have developed an agent-based simulation modeling the detailed psychological and behavioral dynamics of individuals and groups in a potentially hostile crowd. This crowd is modeled as actively engaging with security forces that protect a compound. The user can specify crowd attributes, choose diverse non-lethal weapons and rules-of-engagement, watch the event play out, and see the impacts on key outcomes of crowd attitudes and actions. We present our prototype simulation and initial experimental results. We then discuss our future plans for this research. 1 INTRODUCTION The U.S. Capitol protest and subsequent breach in January 2021 provides a vivid demonstration of the significant role social identity dynamics play in volatile crowd situations. The evidence indicates that several extreme organizations and salient social identity groups arrived with the intention of breaching the Capitol (McDonald and Hymes 2021). Others in the crowd, initially intending only to protest, also stormed and breached the Capitol, helping to overwhelm the Capitol police force (Hoerst 2021). Yet most protesters did not take part in the violence; thousands were at the protest but only several hundred stormed the capitol. During the breach, reactions of the security forces included use of a number of non-lethal weapons and tactics as well as a documented instance of lethal force. The January events at the U.S. Capitol provide a domestic security example of common situations faced by military and security forces. Peacekeepers also encounter unstable, confused, or hostile crowds from opposing social identity groups, and they use a variety of non-lethal approaches to reduce the likelihood of violence. Humanitarian assistance organizations and the security forces protecting them likewise encounter potentially hostile crowds, especially during disasters. How do social identity dynamics and real-time events influence crowd behavior in potentially hostile situations? In turn, how can the composition or behavior of security forces influence the crowd's level of hostility? Individual case studies cannot provide generalizable answers to these questions. By simulating crowd scenarios, including security force size and composition, the set of weapons and tactics used by the force members, and the nature, composition and intentions of the crowd, we can identify weapon choice and rules of engagement that are more likely to produce desired results for crowd management. Over the last several years, our group at the Naval Postgraduate School developed a comprehensive simulation that explicitly models these situations. We emphasize the social identity dynamics of people and groups that have potential to form a hostile crowd, along with physical, psychological and social aspects of