From ‘Criminality’ to Marginality

Rioting against a Broken State

Datos Bibliográficos

ID12978995
AutoresTom Slater (0000-0003-3840-2454, University of Edinburgh, autor de correspondencia)
Año2011
Volumen4
Número3
Páginas106-115
Fecha de publicación2011-11-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaHuman Geography (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1942-7786 • E-ISSN: 2633-674X
EditorialSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/194277861100400307
OpenAlexW2171524964
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas22
Referencias citadas21

This article offers an analysis and critique of the political response to the 2011 urban riots in England. A brief account of the riots is advanced, where I connect the eruptions to the rise of advanced marginality and class/territorial stigmatisation in English cities, not only in terms of material deprivation but to the denial of dignity it implies. The article then re-places the swift deployment of punitive action and the ‘broken society’ discourse in response to the riots within the broader re-engineering of the state according to a neoliberal blueprint that articulates (inter alia) social welfare reduction and penal expansion at the bottom of the class structure, in contrast to a laissez-faire attitude at the top. By paying closer attention to the changing relationship between information and power (and in particular, the role of conservative think tanks), what Paul Gilroy calls a “poverty of the imagination” in addressing urban problems is exposed and challenged, revealing that the main issue to be addressed is not a broken society but a broken state

Blueprint · Class action · Criminology · Denial · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Punitive damages · Sociology · State (computer science · Vagrancy · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Engineering · Homelessness and Social Issues · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism · Law · Psychology