Managed Dissent
The Law of Public Protest

This book provides a comprehensive analysis of the wide-ranging body of law that applies to public protest activity.

Timothy Zick (Author)

9781316519561, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 11 May 2023

318 pages
23.5 x 15.9 x 2.2 cm, 0.61 kg

'… Zick provides a thoughtful, compelling defense of dissent and an important analysis of why dissent is so constrained and disfavored, especially in a nation forged through dissent … Highly recommended.' J. A. Pierceson, Choice

The mass street demonstrations that followed the 2020 police murder of George Floyd were perhaps the largest in American history. These events confirmed that even in a digital era, people rely on public dissent to communicate grievances, change public discourse, and stand in collective solidarity with others. However, the demonstrations also showed that the laws surrounding public protest make public contention more dangerous, more costly, and less effective. Police fired tear gas into peaceful crowds, used physical force against compliant demonstrators, imposed broad curfews, limited the places where protesters could assemble, and abused 'unlawful assembly' and other public disorder laws. These and other pathologies epitomize a system in which public protest is tightly constrained in the name of public order. Managed Dissent argues that in order to preserve the venerable tradition of public protest in the US, we must reform several aspects of the law of public protest.

1. Protest, dissent, and democracy
2. The managerial system
3. Displacing dissent
4. The rising costs of dissent
5. Managing campus protest
6. Arming public protests
7. Protest and emergency powers
8. Protesters' remedies
9. Preserving public protest.

Subject Areas: International law [LB]