ABSTRACT
The principal method of securing compliance was through negotiation with the organizer of the protest. Police evidence to the Home Affairs Committee estimated that 85 per cent of protest marches were preceded by negotiation. Of the 75 protest marches observed as part of this research, only three failed to notify police at all, which amounts to 96 per cent compliance. The task of negotiation, for the police, was to persuade the organizer to hold a protest or other event that was minimally disruptive. Thus, the police have much to offer a protest organizer, but they seek something in return; it is after all a negotiation and that implies that the police have aims they wish to achieve. The process of negotiation, then, involved an exchange in which the protest organizer achieved his or her basic aim, the holding of a protest demonstration, in return for doing so in ways that conformed to the police's basic aim, the avoidance of trouble.
