This volume examines the transformation of politics and social movements at various levels. Starting with a transformation of identity within social movements, it goes on to discuss changes in the scale of social movement mobilisation. The impact of social movements on the state is also considered, with a particular focus upon the ways in which the state is able to incorporate apparently radical political agendas. Finally, the book examines those intellectual and theoretical debates stimulated by recent political transformations.

In 2001, Britain saw another summer of rioting in its cities, with violent uprisings in Oldham, Burnley and Bradford. This book explores the reasons for those riots and explains why they mark a new departure in Britain's racial politics. Riots involving racial factors are nothing new in Britain. Historically violent uprisings could be blamed on heavy policing of predominantly minority communities, but the riots of 2001 were more complex. With elements of 1950s-style race riots and echoes of the 1980s riots which saw South Asians confronting the police as the adversary, the spread of unrest in...