Non-Riotous Behaviour
Analysis
BBC
4.6 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 19 September 2011
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This summer's riots provoked much speculation about the factors which prompted so many people to break the law. But philosopher-turned-commentator Jamie Whyte is more interested in understanding why this sort of thing doesn't happen more often. Is it fear of arrest or is it morality that makes most of the people abide by the law for most of the time? In search of the causes of mass civil obedience, Jamie Whyte speaks to leading experts in the fields of philosophy, psychology and anthropology.
Contributors include: Roger Scruton, philosopher and writer Quentin Skinner, professor of the humanities & expert on modern political thought Tim Harford, the Financial Times Undercover Economist and presenter of More or Less on Radio 4 George Klosko, political philosopher Alex Bentley, anthropologist Carol Hedderman, criminologist
Producer: Simon Coates.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.7 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
| 0:08.5 | As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely engaging voices. |
| 0:18.0 | What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars, |
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| 0:35.4 | Sounds. |
| 0:36.4 | Thank you for downloading this podcast of Analysis. |
| 0:40.1 | In this edition, called Non Riotous Behavior, |
| 0:43.2 | Jamie White considers the reasons why the majority didn't Riot |
| 0:46.5 | in the recent English city disturbances. |
| 0:50.0 | Smashing things, running amuck, making mayhem. |
| 0:53.8 | Something about riotous behavior delights us, especially when we're young. |
| 0:58.4 | Getting a flat screen television, a pair of trainers or a bottle of vodka without paying for it, |
| 1:02.4 | is also nice. |
| 1:04.1 | Which makes it strange that in the weeks following last month's riots, everyone was asking |
| 1:08.4 | how they could have happened. |
| 1:10.5 | As Roger Scrutin, the philosopher and social commentator points out, this question arises from the wrong assumption. |
| 1:17.0 | Riot, that is the normal condition of human beings. |
| 1:20.0 | What needs explaining is why they don't occur, not why they do occur, |
| 1:24.0 | and they don't occur in England on the whole. |
| 1:26.0 | That is an important observation. |
... |
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