Introduction

In the UK since 2009 the face of the far right has become synonymous with that of the English Defence League (EDL), a street-based protest movement that have been regularly embroiled in disorderly protests in English cities and whose rapid growth is largely unprecedented in recent times (Garland and Treadwell, 2010; see also Allen, 2011). While academic accounts have now started to recognise the potential threat to public order that are the hallmarks of this new social movement there has yet been little discussion from criminology or the policing literature that sets out the broader challenge to policing that this group presents. Initially dismissed in the mainstream media or condemned as simply a ‘racist’ far-right organisation, there has been little empirical engagement with those in the organisation (Copsey, 2010; Garland and Treadwell, 2010; 2012; Treadwell and Garland 2011). Instead, the academic literature on the EDL is has been predominantly based on secondary and survey material (Githens-Mazer and Lambert, 2010; Allen, 2011; Bartlett and Littler, 2011). Yet in the wake of the 2011 Norway terrorist attacks that claimed a total of 77 lives, the recognition of the threat that the new counter-jihad movement presents (of which the EDL is a beacon organisation), is steadily growing (Hope Not Hate, 2012).

Elsewhere, the author has been involved in mapping out the contours of the EDL, using as method both covert and overt participant observation of the group as well as interviewing those inside it, facilitating better understanding of the attitudes and values of its supporters (see Garland and Treadwell, 2010, 2012; Treadwell and Garland, 2011). This research has typically entailed periods of involvement as a participant at EDL demonstrations that were subject to a heavy police presence and surveillance, while on other occasions a form of more distanced observation of the policing of the EDL was utilised. This has involved observations of, and interviews with, police officers, active members of the EDL and also extensive research fieldwork (see Treadwell and Garland, 2011; Garland and Treadwell, 2012). On occasion, as a covert EDL member, it has involved having to evade swinging police batons, and being section 60 detained, threatened with arrest, contained and held for long periods on cold car parks and train stations, and witnessing this happen to others.