{"id":52847,"title":"THE FRAGILITY OF RIGHTS: Why Protest is Under Threat in the UK and the US","description":"Across liberal democracies the language of order, security and \u201ccommunity protection\u201d is being used to redraw the boundary between lawful dissent and criminality","content":"\u2026and what that means for us<\/h1>
There\u2019s a myth that rights, once won, are permanent. The last few years have exposed how brittle those gains actually are. Across liberal democracies the language of order, security and \u201ccommunity protection\u201d is being used to redraw the boundary between lawful dissent and criminality. In the UK this has taken a particularly sharp turn: new public order measures give police broader powers to curb demonstrations, and legislation has been reframed so that disruptive civil action can be answered with criminal penalties designed for violent extremism. The result is a chilling effect that makes ordinary acts of protest - sit-ins, occupations, non-violent property disruption - riskier than they used to be.<\/p>
![\"ufvk1fvkhcegdtytuz7t2jglxiaee3kxcq6v0fyncsxeqhhl.jpeg.jpg?w=1140&h=auto\"](\"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/ufvk1fvkhcegdtytuz7t2jglxiaee3kxcq6v0fyncsxeqhhl.jpeg.jpg?w=1140&h=auto\")
In the US the pattern is similar, even if the details differ. State legislatures have moved quickly to create new offences, longer sentences, and tougher policing powers aimed at silencing disruptive protest tactics. Those laws are often sold as common-sense responses to public safety, but civil liberties experts warn they\u2019re written so broadly they sweep up a wide range of legitimate political expression, and they shift the balance of power away from communities and towards law enforcement. That trend isn\u2019t abstract: it teaches organisers to self-censor, deters people from attending demonstrations, and narrows the spaces where collective political pressure can form.<\/p>
One test case for this rollback is the UK government\u2019s decision to proscribe a direct-action group, Palestine Action, under terrorism laws - a move unprecedented for an activist collective focused on property disruption. The proscription, which makes it a criminal offence to belong to, invite support for or express encouragement towards the group, currently faces a legal challenge: courts recently allowed a bid to proceed to judicial review, underscoring that the question of whether criminalising protest under counter-terror powers is lawful and proportionate is very much live. Those proceedings will test whether a state can fold non-violent or property-directed political action into the same legal framework used to fight organised terror.<\/p>
Crucially, the proscription has sparked a response on the streets. Groups including Defend Our Juries have organised repeated actions - monthly mass gatherings, vigils and pledges to risk arrest - explicitly to oppose the proscription and to highlight the absurdity of arresting people for sitting peacefully and holding a sign. These are deliberate, public acts of civil disobedience intended to test the limits of what a democracy will tolerate from its citizens. The scale of arrests and the authorities\u2019 readiness to use anti-terror legislation as a blunt instrument have turned what might once have been a narrow legal debate into a question about what kind of public square we want.<\/p>
![\"fd10kxeagunxsu5xu4lbekciymjpnod1azdovubzjd4d0buc.jpeg.jpeg?w=1140&v=2\"](\"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/fd10kxeagunxsu5xu4lbekciymjpnod1azdovubzjd4d0buc.jpeg.jpeg?w=1140&v=2\")
<\/p>
Why this matters beyond legal theory is simple. Protest is a mechanism for accountability when political institutions fail, when media coverage slumps, or when traditional levers of influence are closed to ordinary people. When the state narrows who can protest, and how, it removes that pressure valve. It also teaches the next generation that political dissent must happen within tightly policed channels or not at all. That\u2019s dangerous in a moment when major policy choices - on climate, housing, warfare and policing - are driven as much by public pressure as by party politics. If those levers are weakened, policy will be shaped by fewer interests, and the most vulnerable will lose the loudest tool they have.<\/p>
So where do we go from here? First, the legal challenges matter. Courts are not neutral instruments; they are one of the few places where the law can be tested against democratic norms. Second, public solidarity with people who take non-violent direct action matters because it forces a democratic conversation about proportionality and purpose. And third, we should be sceptical of arguments that equate disruption with violence and seek to solve political questions with criminal law. Democracies survive conflict not by eliminating disturbance but by allowing it to be expressed, negotiated and resolved in ways that do not permanently dispossess citizens of their voice.<\/p>
![\"sa52qctdiekmdejsek64tnmue2k0spfq5lg4szt2l9rvcro7.jpeg.jpg?w=1140&h=auto\"](\"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/sa52qctdiekmdejsek64tnmue2k0spfq5lg4szt2l9rvcro7.jpeg.jpg?w=1140&h=auto\")
The present moment asks a basic question: do we accept a narrower idea of civic life, where dissent is surveilled, proscribed and punished, or do we insist that the right to disrupt be defended as a legitimate form of political speech? If you care about the health of democratic life, this is not an abstract legal quarrel - it\u2019s a practical battle over who gets to make change and how. In that fight, the fate of Palestine Action and the monthly Defend Our Juries actions are not just stories about one campaign or one country. They are a preview of how modern states will handle dissent in years to come.<\/p>
![\"yyuuvriwtks2mukxsv9pai7xtmiwsthmxweqa1awbzfjdu0p.jpeg.jpeg?w=1140&v=2\"](\"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/yyuuvriwtks2mukxsv9pai7xtmiwsthmxweqa1awbzfjdu0p.jpeg.jpeg?w=1140&v=2\")