ABSTRACT
Containment by the State of violence and disorder raises problems of a conceptual, practical, and constitutional nature. In the first place, the boundaries between potentially disorderly activities, such as demonstrating, picketing, and civil disobedience on the one hand and criminal or violent activity on the other are not in every circumstance crystal clear. From one society to another, the legal and constitutional issues that arise out of the peacekeeping or repressive activities of government will depend upon the relation between politicians on the one hand and the police, armed services, and law enforcement mechanisms on the other. In this essay1 I briefly examine the experience of the United Kingdom in the use of official force to contain unlawful violence and the questions of principle that arise from it.
