Race-related civil disturbances in contemporary Britain : a case study of Pakistanis in post-2001 race riots Bradford

Abstract EN

This article broaches the issue of race-related riots in the northern British city Bradford in the aftermath of the race riots of 2001.

Such riots were read as symptomatic of lack of community cohesion and the immediate outcome of ethnic residential segregation and socio-cultural separateness.

Yet, the author of the present article argues that what appeared to be ethnic responsibility for such civil disturbances is, in fact, an oversimplification of a complex and complicated factors that produced such morbid tensions in localities like Bradford.

Even the claims of ethnic residential themselves are proved to be an exaggeration of the true local picture at best and mystification at worst.

The article scrutinizes Pakistani ethnic minority in Bradford and shows how it is a diverse and a pluralist community in contrast to their mainstream stereotypical representation as a homogenous aggressive block.