ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses how officers in command of public order operations exert control. The proposal that in order to retain "cadre" status officers should frequently command public order operations was seen as a threat, for it entailed that unknown individuals of unproven experience would be seeking to take command of operations in central London. To cushion them, steps were usually taken to assign more experienced subordinates to their command team. Notting Hill command teams jokingly remarked that such exercises invariably concluded with Armageddon and the carnival being terminated in disorder. On the face of it, major public order operations are impressive organizational structures. Paradoxically, it is the smaller, less problematic minor operations that allow senior officers more direct control because there they can intervene directly and are not reliant upon a chain of command that may prove tenuous.
