Police Stops in Europe: A Citadel Under Siege, But Still Standing

As an issue for public debate, police stops are not new. In the United States, the Kerner Commission in 1968 identified controls as one of the triggers of the urban riots of the 1960s. In England, the riots in Brixton, South London, in 1981 followed the massive use of the ‘sus laws’ to search young Black men during Operation Swamp. In both countries, high-profile incidents bring the debate to the forefront with some regularity. Indeed, we are very familiar with some of the associated names: Rodney King; Eric Garner; Michael Brown; George Floyd.