Assemblies, Coalitions, and Conflicts Over Free Speech: From “Trespass” to “Encroachment” in Urban Space at Hyde Park, London, 1861–1962

Abstract

Copyright © 2022 The Author. By drawing, among others, on the ideas of the Bakhtin Circle and Judith Butler, this paper explores spatial struggles over the right to free speech at Hyde Park, London, 1861–1962. From the 1860s to the early 20th century, the state gradually constructed a “monologic” discourse about an ideal-typical “indecent” speaker who would “trespass” on Hyde Park through their “excitable speech” against a legally sanctioned right to give a “public address” in the park. This discourse gave the state some room to evict those it claimed to be transgressing “public address”. However, different “heteroglossic coalitions” of regulars ensured that Hyde Park remained not only a “political assembly” to discuss political issues, but also a “social assembly” to exercise free speech on a range of social topics. Indeed, by the 1950s, these coalitions used a nearby road scheme to successfully argue it was the state that was potentially trespassing, or “encroaching”, on free speech at Hyde Park.