Do the scenes in London and Seattle present a favourable or unfavourable image of democracy and anarchy?
Dr David Starkey: Bill Clinton said the riots presented a double face. There were lots of wrong-headed but sincere, passionate people protesting peacefully. A democracy that cannot take street protests is very seriously at risk. Equally there is no reason why we should tolerate violence. Protesting against capitalism is foolish. We’re all well-off because of capitalism. The Labour government want to censor the internet because they’re terrified of freedom. Helen Mary Jones: It’s because of global capitalism that you have hundreds of children dying every day Africa. There is evidence to suggest the police did overreact. A very small minority of people undermined what was a serious protest. You haven’t seen those numbers of people on the streets in America since Vietnam. If people had simply written to their MPs we wouldn’t be discussing it now. We can’t disregard the idea of agents provocoteurs. Eva Pascoe: We will see more of these protests because they were organised on the internet.
