{"id":24851,"date":"2015-09-06T15:38:38","date_gmt":"2015-09-06T20:38:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/?p=24851"},"modified":"2015-09-06T15:40:44","modified_gmt":"2015-09-06T20:40:44","slug":"narrative-and-social-control","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2015\/09\/narrative-and-social-control\/","title":{"rendered":"Narrative and Social Control"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"copslogo\"<\/a>In recent decades, awareness of narrative and of stories in general has increased in many fields and academic disciplines, law included.\u00a0 However, it is nevertheless surprising to see that even law enforcement specialists in the Justice Department have developed an appreciation of the workings and importance of narrative.<\/p>\n

This heightened sensitivity surfaced in the recent Justice Department report<\/a> on police conduct in Ferguson, Missouri following the shooting of Michael Brown.\u00a0 Issued by the Department\u2019s \u201cCommunity Oriented Policing Services\u201d office, the report outlines no fewer than 113 lessons that police in Missouri and elsewhere might learn from developments during the seventeen days following Brown\u2019s death and funeral.<\/p>\n

Much of the report is predictable.\u00a0 It criticizes such police tactics as the use of dogs, tear gas, and so-called \u201coverwatching.\u201d\u00a0 With the latter, police use rifle sights to survey a crowd from positions on top of police vehicles.\u00a0 Overall, the report warns that \u201cmilitarization\u201d of a volatile situation will probably make things worse.<\/p>\n

Toward the end of the report, its authors turn to what they label \u201clost narrative.\u201d\u00a0 In their opinion, Missouri law enforcement was too slow to provide information about the shooting of Brown and thereby created an opening for alternative representations of the incident.\u00a0 Supporters of Brown and his family seized the opportunity and offered an alternative narrative, one conveyed largely but not completely through the social media and one stressing that \u201cBlack Lives Matter.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cLaw enforcement,\u201d the report laments, \u201clost the narrative to social media.\u201d<\/p>\n

The timeliness of a narrative from law enforcement, of course, is only one factor in what happened in Missouri and elsewhere in the spring and summer of 2014.\u00a0 Yet the Justice Department specialists did sense correctly that narrative is an important part of social control.\u00a0 A well-constructed story conveys messages and meanings on which listeners and readers might rely as guides for their conduct.<\/p>\n

But did the Justice Department specialists fully appreciate the power of narrative cutting in a different direction?\u00a0 A meaningful narrative, after all, is also important for those resisting social control. \u00a0Distraught and deprived people are more likely to achieve liberation and social justice if they are armed with a good story about social life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In recent decades, awareness of narrative and of stories in general has increased in many fields and academic disciplines, law included.\u00a0 However, it is nevertheless surprising to see that even law enforcement specialists in the Justice Department have developed an appreciation of the workings and importance of narrative. This heightened sensitivity surfaced in the recent […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[98,30,76,44,122,57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-civil-rights","category-criminal-justice","category-media-journalism","category-political-processes-rhetoric","category-public","category-race-and-the-law","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24851\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}