A criminologist and sociologist in Dundee has said he would not be “massively surprised” to see riots spread to Scottish cities.
Abertay University lecturer Dr Stuart Waiton said a lack of respect for authority was at the root of the disturbances.
The riots have caused widespread property damage and led to looting in several English cities, including London, Manchester and Birmingham, over the past few days.
Dr Waiton, who is also chairman of research group Youth Generation Issues and author of the book Scared Of The Kids, said youths involved in rioting had become disconnected from their communities and wider society.
He said although this situation has not deteriorated as badly north of the border as it has in England, riots here would not be a shock.
He said, “I would not be massively surprised if they happened in Scotland there are a few key differences, but also similarities.
“I don’t see the police being any more authoritative.”
He added, “Like in England they have turned themselves into social workers rather than dealing with crime.
“The sense of authority and trust and belief in institutions in Scotland is no different. I don’t think people are any more engaged with these institutions.”Adults ‘impotent’Dr Waiton said, “I also think there is excessive policing where there shouldn’t be all these community safety initiatives encourage adults to take a back seat.
“Basically, adults have been made to be impotent.”
Dr Waiton said this week’s clashes have little in common with earlier riots that took place in London in the 1980s.
“In contrast to the 1980s, and what was interesting to see, was that the police basically stood back on the first night of trouble,” he said.
“This is nothing to do with their kit. They are more tooled up than they were in the 1980s.
“There was a crisis of authority within the police itself in terms of what to do and how to act.”
He added, “Police have turned themselves into a community support service… so when something like this happened they just stood back.”
Dr Waiton said there is no political element to the disturbances.
He said, “The second thing that is also very different from the 1980s is that then riots were a reaction to severe racial persecution within specific, very poor communities.
“In a sense the riots were a reflection of those communities.”
He added, “Here, those kids have no sense of community at all they are childish and narcissistic.
“In the 1980s, riots were relatively well-organised. In Toxteth people came out with baseball bats and Molotov cocktails they were a force to be reckoned with.
“Here they were a disparate group of self-involved youths and the police seemed entirely incapable of dealing with it.”
Dr Waiton said there is also a racial element to the riots in England that does not exist in Scotland, because communities are generally less divided along ethnic or religious grounds.
“Scotland is a more conservative, static society,” he said.
“It’s less post-modern, by which I mean people generally still have some connection to their community.
“Scotland also has very few communities that are predominantly based on ethnic identities.”
Dr Waiton added that fear of being cast as racist has prevented adults from tackling antisocial behaviour and attitude among children from ethnic backgrounds.
“I think what’s interesting is that youths are patronised rather than challenged,” he said.
“We’ve got a less judgmental attitude in general.”‘An asocial society’He added, “Adults rarely assert their authority youths from ethnic minorities are seen as having ‘their’ culture, whatever that means.
“Whether it’s gangster rap or wearing hoodies and they adopt a childish persona, they are not challenged because people are concerned about being accused of racism.
“Too much attention, and money, has been spent on antisocial behaviour in recent years when the much more fundamental problem is the creation of an asocial society one in which the authorities may discuss ‘respect’ as an apparent antidote to antisocial behaviour, but do so in a self-referential and therapeutic way.
“When everyone and everything is deserving of ‘respect’ it simply turns into a form of indulgence and flattery lacking content and actually limiting the capacity of older people and communities from forming and indeed enforcing a sense of what is right and wrong.”
Earlier this year Dr Waiton claimed plans by the Scottish Government to introduce jail sentences of up to five years for anyone found guilty of abusive and sectarian behaviour while watching football are a draconian assault on civil liberties.
The laws would apply to anyone watching football, whether they are at a stadium, in a pub or even just commenting online.