In 1977 Natan Sharansky was sentenced to 13 years in a Soviet prison for high treason and “anti-Soviet” activities. In truth, he had been campaigning for human rights in the Soviet Union and the right of Soviet Jews to emigrate. He was ultimately freed in 1986 but during the time in prison he had a long time to think about what freedom meant. He explained it in a book written in 2004 with Ron Dermer: The Case for Democracy: The Power of Freedom to Overcome Tyranny and Terror. He divided the world into two categories: free societies in and fear societies. He explained (pp40-41) how to determine in which category a given country falls:
Can a person walk into the middle of a town square and express his views without fear of arrest, imprisonment, or physical harm? If he can, then that person is living in a free society. If not, it’s a fear society.
It is with this powerful argument in mind that I am not pleased to see images such as this in today’s press:
The Guardian explains:
Police have moved in to clear tents from London’s Parliament Square, which has been a focus for protesters campaigning on issues including the war in Afghanistan.
The Metropolitan police said that officers had arrived on the scene at around 7.30pm on Monday to remove “all tents and sleeping equipment”.
The move comes after the passing of the police reform and social responsibility bill, for which the home secretary had created an amendment that outlawed the setting up in Parliament Square of “any tent, or any other structure that is designed, or adapted … for the purpose of facilitating sleeping or staying in”.
Protesters – led initially by the late peace campaigner Brian Haw – have occupied the pavement opposite the Houses of Parliament for about a decade and set up “Democracy Village” on the green in May 2010.
They were evicted in July last year by the Greater London Authority following a high court order, but some protesters then pitched tents on the pavement next to the lawn.
The BBC adds:
Two people were arrested during the eviction process for breaching a law preventing encampments around Parliament Square.
While it is true, as one commentator on Twitter put it, “the whole country is a Democracy Village,” there is something powerful about the images of protest right outside the buildings where our laws are made.
Perhaps people sleeping in tents on Parliament Square is an expression of freedom too far and the law to allow the removal of tents or other sleeping structures to be removed from the vicinity is a reasonable one. But at the same time, I see no reason why Parliament Square should not be open to protesters. I would far prefer a Parliament Square whereby from 7.00am until 10.00pm every day individuals had the right to protest, hold up banners, perhaps set up a trestle table and solicit signatures for petitions on various causes, than one where such acts were impermissible.
