Contested Legitimacy in Ferguson
Nine Hours on Canfield Drive

This Element analyses interactions between insurgents, authorities, and third parties contributing to the insurgency in Ferguson.

Joshua Bloom (Author)

9781009074865, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 17 March 2022

75 pages
22.8 x 15.1 x 0.5 cm, 0.134 kg

At noon on August 9, 2014 when Michael Brown was killed on Canfield Drive in Ferguson, there was little protest. But by 9 pm, dozens were nonviolently defying police armed with military style weapons, armored vehicles, helicopters, and snarling dogs. The structural situation alone cannot account for the emergence of insurgency in Ferguson. To explain mobilization, I advance a theory of Contested Legitimacy. The stakes of each action by insurgents, authorities, and third parties for mobilization concern regulatory repression. Actions that undercut the validity of repression encourage mobilization. Video, photo, and textual data make it possible to unpack the complex interactive process of mobilization. Given longstanding grievances concerning racist policing in Ferguson, reclaiming the site where Michael Brown was killed on Canfield Drive as a memorial provided means to challenge unjust police authority. When police responded as accustomed– disproportionately, callous, and indiscriminate – their actions galvanized local Black support for activists.

1. Introduction
2. Data Collection and Narrative Construction
3. Nine Hours on Canfield Drive
4. Contested Legitimacy
5. Lessons for Anti-racist Activists.

Subject Areas: Demonstrations & protest movements [JPWF], Political activism [JPW]