Pre-modern Policing in the UK: A glimpse

 
Following my post on the worrying direction modern UK policing is taking, I happened to flick through Henry James' English Hours, a book about his experiences in England.

Illustration by Joseph Pennell [1]

Then I found this in the introduction to the book:

England's treatment of political radicals was another example of this general equality. On the day the Queen opened Parliament, James had witnessed a demonstration in Trafalgar Square 'which might easily have given on the nerves of a sensitive police department'. But the English police were unperturbed; they allowed the demonstrators to 'sun themselves' freely. James was struck by the 'frank good sense and the frank good humour and even the frank good taste of it', as well as by

the fact that the might mob could march along and do its errand while the excellent quiet policemen — eternal, imperturbable, positive, lovable reminders of the national temperament — stood by simply to see that the channel was kept clear and comfortable.

It was political revolutionaries like this 'mighty mob' — as well as those he had witnessed in France — that James was remembering when he wrote The Princess Casamassima. [2]

Almost enough to make one slightly nostalgic, no?


Coming soon: a consideration of The Princess Casamassima.


___________________

[1] Accompanying the essay "London" by Henry James in The Century; a popular quarterly Volume 0037 Issue 2 (Dec 1888), pp. 219-239. Available online: http://digital.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=cent;cc=cent;rgn=full%20text;idno=cent0037-2;didno=cent0037-2;view=image;seq=00229;node=cent0037-2:1 [Accessed: 18-Dec-2010]
[2] Introduction to English Hours, Henry James (1905), p. xxxv [ed. Alma Louise Lowe, 1960, Readers' Union reprint (not for sale to the public) Heinemann London 1962]

Modern Policing in the UK

 
My friend just sent me a couple of links to items he said made him feel "angry and upset". So be warned.

One link is to an article from The Guardian about protestor Jody McIntyre being tipped out of his wheelchair and dragged across the street, here.

The other to a (slightly glitchy) YouTube video of a BBC interview with McIntyre, in which he is asked at least twice whether he was "rolling towards" the police in question:



The BBC interviewer (Ben Brown) asks some other frankly absurd questions. For example, would McIntyre label himself as a "revolutionary"? But since when did a person's beliefs become reasonable grounds for inflicting violence when that person poses no threat?

Perhaps one could argue that beliefs, statements, even statements of fact constitute some sort of threat. But the point here is that McIntyre posed no physical threat to the police, even if one were to argue that in his beliefs he posed some sort of threat to society.

Surely in the policing of protest, the police are ideally looking to prevent or stop violence and destruction. That is, they should deal with physical threats or actions and not with why the protesters are actually there. Whether that is what the police have actually been doing in practice is another question, perhaps one the BBC should have asked instead of looking into McIntyre's beliefs.

McIntyre is fortunately very articulate and patient on several points: though it might be reasonable for an interviewer to ask if he has complained to the police, it seems less so to ask the same question three times when the interviewee has already given a perfectly reasonable response. Which McIntyre did — it seems eminently sensible that he first consider his legal options.

And he's right to point out that these are not isolated incidents in recent policing by the Met. Remember Ian Tomlinson, or Delroy Smellie, or very recently Alfie Meadows (here, here, and here).

The footage will stir certain emotions and doubtless cause many to feel anger. And the debate around the cuts and fees means that some will already have taken sides. But whether or not McIntyre and other students are right is besides the point. Just as whether or not McIntyre was, according to The Observer, a "cyber-radical" is surely irrelevant to his treatment at a protest. The arguments for or against the coalition's decision to cut funding for higher education and raise tuition fees seem to me to be very separate from the issues of policing or the media's coverage of protest.
 

Review: Economics: A Very Short Introduction by Partha Dasgupta (2007, 172pp.)

If there's one thing all three main parties in the U.K. agree on, — if there's one thing that hasn't been changed by the Liberal Democrats' sudden emergence as a main contender on the political stage, — it's the importance of economic growth. Of course, there isn't just one thing; bickering aside, the three prospective leaders probably share very similar views on lots of things in principle, but as Gordon Brown learned first-time-round, repeatedly saying "I agree" doesn't make for much of a televised debate. Right now, economics — The Economy — is pretty much as up there as you can get on the political agenda. You'd be hard pressed to find a politician who isn't talking about it. And you know things are bad when Greece's socialist leader is talking about how to make the country 'competitive' and 'viable' again, just like it was any other big, shiny business.

So given the headlines of late and over the last year (whereever you look), there's probably no better short non-fiction book to be reading right now than Partha Dasgupta's Economics: A Very Short Introduction. As with all the books in Oxford University Press' series (except maybe the one on the E.U.), this one can be picked up and put down — or into a coat pocket — with relative ease. It'll also help you understand that little bit more about the world we all seem to be currently inhabiting. Finally, importantly, the author seems to achieve the appropriate mix of enlightening and depressing that makes such books worth reading.

One of the reasons that this book is so accessible is that Dasgupta begins at the ground-level, with sketches of two ten-year-old children — one in the developed world, one in the developing. They are both similar in many respects, and yet they both live in totally different worlds. Dasgupta claims that economics can help us understand why those worlds are so different. Throughout his mostly straightforward explanations of complicated and abstract concepts it's his constant recourse to the human causes and effects that keeps the theory side relevant and applicable to the real world.

Review: Him With His Foot In His Mouth by Saul Bellow (1984, 294pp.)

This review contains a few excerpts from the book but doesn't spoil any surprises.

Featuring just five short pieces, Him With His Foot In His Mouth might be an ideal introduction for those who have never read anything by Saul Bellow. The collection showcases his unique voice and style, while familiar readers can find some interesting new perspectives on the usual themes.

The longest story in the collection, for example, is called 'What Kind Of Day Did You Have?'. It's underscored by Bellow's trademark examination of what it means to live in a mass society more organised than its individual members, among the rubble of grand ideas and failed dreams. At the centre of the piece is Victor Wulpy, a mouthpiece for Bellow's various anthropolitical musings, trying 'to pole his way upon a walking stick against the human tides of airports'.

Excuses, excuses. . . .

For recent lack of posting to this blog:

• A spate of busy-ness
• A bout of illness
• A series of recent musical interludes and upheavals
  

Between 'The Day' And 'Deep-Night Clarity'

I finished reading a collection of Saul Bellow stories last night. Most books by Bellow, there's rarely a page where something doesn't resound or resonate, where something doesn't ring a bell. I was reading 'Cousins' the last in the collection I have and, what with the sun flung well below the horizon some-many hours previous, I was flagging — when Bellow struck this one. It was more like an alarm bell:

Sleep is out of the question, so instead of going to bed I make myself some strong coffee. No use sacking out; I'd only go on thinking.

Insomnia is not a word I'd apply to the sharp thrills of deep-night clarity that come to me. During the day the fusspot habits of a lifetime prevent real discovery. I have learned to be grateful for the night hours that harrow the nerves and tear up the veins—"lying in restless ecstasy." To want this and to bear it, you need a strong soul. [1]

Review: For Esmé — With Love And Squalor by J. D. Salinger (1953, 215pp)

This review contains a few excerpts from the book but doesn't spoil any surprises.

In the interests of full disclosure, I have a confession to make. The Catcher In The Rye was a very important book for me. I read it one summer as a still tender nineteen-year-old, working in a quiet pub, saving for my move to university in the autumn. I'm sure many of its readers will know what I'm talking about when I say the novel's narrator Holden Caulfield seemed to perfectly embody my own naive cynicism while simultaneously showing up everything that was wrong with it.

For Esmé — With Love And Squalor is the UK title for a collection of Salinger's short pieces, which in the US is simply called Nine Stories. All nine will be of interest to anyone who was impressed or moved by Salinger's most popular novel, but they might also provide an interesting taster for readers who've yet to be swayed by The Catcher In The Rye's often earnest admirers.