Riotous Citizens

Ethnic Conflict in Multicultural Britain

In 2001, Britain saw another summer of rioting in its cities, with violent uprisings in Oldham, Burnley and Bradford. This book explores the reasons for those riots and explains why they mark a new departure in Britain's racial politics. Riots involving racial factors are nothing new in Britain. Historically violent uprisings could be blamed on heavy policing of predominantly minority communities, but the riots of 2001 were more complex. With elements of 1950s-style race riots and echoes of the 1980s riots which saw South Asians confronting the police as the adversary, the spread of unrest in 2001 was also clearly linked to poverty, unemployment and the involvement of the political far-right. Linking original empirical research conducted amongst the Pakistani community in Bradford with a sophisticated conceptual analysis, this book will be required reading for courses on race and ethnicity, social movements and policing public order.