From citizen to subject: police militarisation and the imperial boomerang

Militarised policing is one of the preconditions for fascist rule, but how and why would police in liberal democracies militarise?

This lecture explores police militarisation in Britain and the US from the beginnings of modern police through the present. It shows that militarisation is not the product of right-leaning regimes only but rather an effect of the imperial boomerang. Militarisation reflects the tactics and tools of empire brought home to manage perceived racialised threats.