THE BATTLE-OF-WESTMINSTER - DEVELOPING THE SOCIAL IDENTITY MODEL OF CROWD BEHAVIOR IN ORDER TO EXPLAIN THE INITIATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF COLLECTIVE CONFLICT

This paper aims to extend the social identity approach to crowd behavi our (Reicher, 1984, 1987) in order to understand how crowd events, and crowd conflict in particular, develop over time. The analysis derives from a detailed account of a violent confrontation between students a nd police during a demonstration held in November 1988-the so-called ' Battle of Westminster'. It focuses on how students came to be involved in the conflict, how the conflict spread and upon the psychological c onsequences of involvement. This analysis is used to develop general h ypotheses concerning the initiation and development of collective conf lict. It is concluded that, while the social identity model is of use in understanding these phenomena, it is necessary to recognize how soc ial categories are constructed and reconstructed in the dynamics of in tergroup interaction.