Public space in social movements : characterizing the place where protest turns violent

Abstract

Protests generally take place in public space. Non-violence demonstration is considered a more reasonable way to protest in contemporary; however, some protests sometimes turn violent. Literature has been exploring its mechanism from many perspectives such as sociology and psychology, but few have looked at the relationships between urban spatiality and place of conflict. An analytical framework is proposed to portray the “repertoire” in the time and places where violence triggered. By comparison research among international cases and Hong Kong, the study characterizes where protest escalates to violence finds a probable pattern: depend on the space prototype, protesters and police show different reactions in the conflicts.