Meanwhile those organisers who want, or need to know more about protests, and how they fit or not into the events industry can buy a fascinating book on the subject.

Published this year Protests As Events is a collection of writings on the subject edited by Ian R. Lamond, Lecturer of Events Management, and Karl Spracken, Professor of Leisure Studies, both at Leeds Beckett University and themselves participators in protests, pickets and marches, so some practical experience to draw on. The 269-page book is published by Rowman and Littlefield and covers the motivation for, the management of and the effectiveness of protests.

One interesting study carried out by the New York Times newspaper on 342 US protests in the 28 years from 1962 to 1990 showed that what mattered most to the protesters was not their number but the amount of press coverage their protest generated, with the stock price of companies protested against falling by one tenth of a percent for every paragraph printed.

Makes you think…