Civil disorder
Conversely, a skilled leader can calm or divert a crowd using strategic suggestions, commands, or appeals to reason, aiming to de-escalate a situation.
[1] Emotional contagion plays a significant role in crowd behaviour by fostering a sense of unity among its members.
[1] During civil disorder, panic can set in when a crowd member realizes – A goal of violent demonstrators is to spur law enforcers to take action that can be exploited as acts of brutality in order to generate sympathy for their cause, and/or to anger and demoralize the opposition.
For example, crowds may form human blockades to shut down roads, they may trespass on government property, they may try to force mass arrests, they may handcuff themselves to things or to each other, or they may lock arms, making it more difficult to separate them, or they might create confusion or diversions through the use of rock throwing, arson, or terrorist acts, giving leeway to law enforcers to be forceful or excessive while trying to remove them.
[1] If a crowd turns violent, effectively becoming a "mob," it may execute physical attacks on people and property, such as by throwing homemade weapons like Molotov cocktails, firing small arms, and planting improvised explosive devices.
[1] Mobs often employ fire, smoke, or hidden explosive devices e.g. strapped to animals, masked in cigarette lighters or toys, rigged to directed vehicles, etc.
[1] According to the U.S. Code, a person is engaged in civil disorder if he or she - (1)"...teaches or demonstrates to any other person the use, application, or making of any firearm or explosive or incendiary device, or technique capable of causing injury or death to persons, knowing or having reason to know or intending that the same will be unlawfully employed for use in, or in furtherance of, a civil disorder which may in any way or degree obstruct, delay, or adversely affect commerce or the movement of any article or commodity in commerce or the conduct or performance of any federally protected function; or... (2)...transports or manufactures for transportation in commerce any firearm, or explosive or incendiary device, knowing or having reason to know or intending that the same will be used unlawfully in furtherance of a civil disorder; or...
When emotional tension is high among law enforcement agents, they may breach their feeling of restraint and commit acts, against people in the mob, that they normally would suppress.
[1] Like mob members, law enforcement agents, acting as a group, can also lose their sense of individuality and develop a feeling of anonymity.
[1] Like the mob, these conditions make law enforcement actors more likely to imitate the behavior of each other, which can result in a chain of biased, excessive, or otherwise, dangerous, behavior in which law enforcement agents act upon mob agents as impersonal threats and not as human beings.
"[1] Actions by law enforcement agents, motivated by emotion and prejudice, is often used as evidence against their ill will toward a crowd, or a mob, with their behavior only further inflaming confrontation rather than reducing it.
