Police Response to Uncivil Anti-Police Protests

Recent literature in political philosophy has argued that protesting against police brutality can permissibly involve uncivil conduct, including damage to property and confrontation with police officers. If this view is correct, how should the police respond to uncivil protestors? This paper challenges the prevailing view amongst criminologists and political philosophers alike, which holds that the police should respond forcefully to violent protestors in order restore order and peace. Instead, I argue that police should adopt a discerning approach which permits permissible forms of incivility while minimizing impermissible harm. This argument is grounded in protestors’ moral rights to engage in uncivil conduct in response to systemic injustices and in the duties of police officers to assist them in carrying out their protest in permissible ways.