Policing Dissent: Social Control and the Anti-Globalization Movement

Chapter 6: “Here Come the Anarchists”: The Psychological Control of Space

138 Chapter 6 “Here Come the Anarchists” The Psychological Control of Space Law enforcement uses numerous psychological tactics to control protest, constructing the meaning of antiglobalization activism through public relations campaigns and media messages. Psychological tactics are social control techniques that operate at the level of the mind, with the goal of creating fear and making it difficult for protesters to successfully mobilize. These police marketing efforts frame the movement as violent, dangerous, and irresponsible, heightening the anxieties of local residents as well as activists. Psychological tactics, then, involve the cultural production of meaning. They are inherently about the struggle over how the general public understands and reacts to protesters. These tactics generally take the form of carefully manicured media campaigns that influence opinions and thus make it difficult for protesters to successfully mobilize people. The Framing Process To understand the cultural production of meaning as it relates to protests, social movement scholars have introduced the concept of framing (Gamson et al. 1982, Snow and Benford 1988). This is the process by which activists turn vague ideas and grievances into coherent arguments that mobilize people Chap-06.qxd 12/13/07 4:51 PM Page 138 (Snow et al. 1986, Tarrow 1992, Noonan 1995, McAdam 1996, Zald 1996, Benford and Snow 2000). Framing starts with the idea that social movements are already implicated in the reconstruction of reality. Benford and Snow (2000) describe it as meaning work—an active and contentious process of producing meaning to challenge existing conditions. From this perspective, social movements do not grow independently from larger structural conditions. Instead, activists carefully, strategically, and collectively craft meaning around their contentious actions. These collective action frames help movements identify problems, communicate them to a larger public, and mobilize individuals to join them (Benford and Snow 2000). Much of the academic work on framing revolves around how social movements construct meaning to mobilize individuals (Ayres 2004). How do movements frame their grievances? How do they use frames to attract and mobilize individuals to their cause? While these are important questions, they are only indirectly related to the social control process. I am interested in looking at the other side of the issue: how does the state, through law enforcement agencies, frame protest to minimize participation in movements? Public Relations Experts The framing process of social movements tends to be collective and organic. It usually involves limited resources and is conducted by activists or organizations with little or no budgets. In contrast, the framing resources available to the police are more extensive and often include trained public relations officers. Months before a protest, police develop and implement sophisticated communication strategies that sometimes involve hiring corporate consulting firms to implement multi-targeted media messages. The policing of the 2002 G8 summit in Kananaskis Village, Alberta, is a clear case of how law enforcement agencies can use “Here Come the Anarchists” 139 Chap-06.qxd 12/13/07 4:51 PM Page 139 state resources to implement a media and communication campaign that decreases mobilization. Months before the protest, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, along with the Calgary Police Service, hired GPC International to design and implement a communication strategy. GPC International is a partner company of Fleishman Hillard, one of the largest public relations firms in the world. The Canadian police were motivated to work on public relations because they had received negative publicity during the policing of previous large antiglobalization protests. In 2001, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police had attacked protesters at an international economic meeting in Ottawa, an action that was harshly criticized in national Canadian newspapers. That same year, Italian police had killed an anti-globalization protester at the G8 summit meeting in Genoa, resulting in mass protests across Europe. Because both the G8 and Canadian law enforcement needed a legitimacy boost, the police adopted a negotiated approach in Calgary. During a telephone interview, a high-ranking employee of GPC International described his role in planning for the G8 protests: My first role was to stay at the offices here at GPC and write the strategic communication plan. I needed to identify the audiences, identify the messages, and design a multilevel communication approach. So essentially my role was to draft a document that described the strategic direction for the integrated policing team. Then the second role was the communications council. At that point I joined the team and moved into a separate building. I...