It is September in the year of our Lord 2020, and the world is ending once again. In the midst of our second stay away from university, (US)America has refused to go down without more high-profile cases of police brutality, bringing the Black Lives Matter protests back onto New Zealand screens.[1] Why do the police, an organisation supposedly committed to reinforcing law and order, appear to be at the heart of this social ill? What is it about the police that shapes them into a tool for oppression?
In New Zealand (as in American) society, the state has a monopoly on violence, the rights to which are vested in the New Zealand Police and military. The implicit threat of violence against unlawful action is used to maintain law and order and coerce us into abiding by the laws set out by the government. This system seems fine on the surface – after all, we’re the ones making the laws in a democratic society, right? We vote our representatives into Parliament, and they cast votes on political issues that broadly represent their district’s views. Through representative democracy, each and every citizen has a voice. It is through that participation that the state gains the legitimacy to maintain a monopoly on violence.
Unfortunately, the interests of workers are often outclassed by the influence of capital and money. In 2010, during the filming of the Hobbit movies, New Zealand actor’s union Actors Equity issued a stop work order on the production of the series in order to demand better working conditions and equitable treatment. Worried that this would cause Warner Bros. to pull production out of the country entirely (which, in fairness, was very possible), then Prime Minister John Key rushed the infamous Employment Relations Amendment Bill (the ‘Hobbit Law’) through parliament, destroying film workers of all kinds’ rights to collectively bargain while offering international film corporations tax breaks to the tune of $7.5 million NZD per picture.[2] These rights are only now being restored after almost a decade of actors’ inability to resist exploitation. The profit margins of film execs were deemed more important than worker’s rights.
Class isn’t the only divide when it comes to the eyes of the law. Over half of our prison population is Māori when they comprise only 16.5% of the general population, and Māori are over twice as likely as Pākehā to be imprisoned when found guilty of the same crime.[3] Is the state monopoly on violence being used for the benefit of these groups? Can such violence truly be considered legitimate when it both leads to inequitable outcomes and enforces laws which are not always created according to the interests of New Zealanders? Even a single exception to the idea that our society is run according to the will of the people calls the legitimacy of state violence (and therefore state policing) into question. In reality, the police as an instrument of state violence is overwhelmingly used to reinforce the power of the state, with protecting the people being a nice bonus that justifies its existence.
Enter the Black Lives Matter protests. Much of anti-BLM rhetoric centers on the lawlessness of the movement, drawing upon the imagery of a violent, riotous mob to cast doubt upon its legitimacy. They point to the rocks thrown, the broken windows, and ask “how can we trust that these people have the right intentions when they are so brutal?” But what makes violence in self-defence (which has been relatively muted) illegitimate when the state has used its ‘legitimate’ monopoly on violence to literally murder its own citizens in broad daylight?[4] The language of legitimacy as we understand it inherently favours the powerful. Rather than working within the framework of the state, the legitimacy of BLM is found in how it fulfils our obligations to each other’s wellbeing and safety. Violence is not necessarily a good idea in every situation, but it also does not necessarily make a movement illegitimate.
References:
[1] BBC News, Jacob Blake: What we know about Wisconsin police shooting
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53909766
[2] Lindsay Ellis, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Warners (Part 3/2)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qi7t_g5QObs
[3a] Department of Corrections, Prison facts and statistics – June 2020
[3b] NZ Herald, Maori imprisoned at twice rate of Europeans for same crime
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11709631
[4] The News & Observer, Over 90% of Black Lives Matter demonstrations this summer were peaceful, analysis shows
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/nation-world/national/article245491375.html
Further reading (lots of anarchism, you have been warned):
Anonymous authors, The Illegitimacy of Violence, the Violence of Legitimacy
https://crimethinc.com/2012/03/27/the-illegitimacy-of-violence-the-violence-of-legitimacy
Noncompete, How do Anarchist police and military work? | How Anarchism Works Part 3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hmy1jjRnl8I&t=268s
Thought Slime, All Cops Are Bad
You make many fantastic points with this piece. The use of force as a disciplinary tool is strange at best, especially when considering who this force is being used upon. Our police force, much like the American one, have access to guns. The main difference is the fact that New Zealand police don’t carry them on their person at all times. I can only imagine what it would be like if they could carry like in America. Class issues are also another harrowing reality relating to the police. If you aren’t a part of the elite few on top, then the police force isn’t designed to act in your best interests. If they decide that they don’t like you, they can make life very hard very quick. What we see overseas should be a warning to us to look into our own system and it’s faults, but that’s rather unlikely.
Good job on making everything so concise!