‘Civil unrest’ is an umbrella term for a wide spectrum of phenomena, and although there is no commonly agreed United Nations definition the term is used widely among United Nations agencies, funds and programmes, particularly to describe violent and non-violent group acts.
" }, "editorialNote": { "en": [ "source:UNDRR HIPS" ] }, "scopeNote": { "en": [ "Despite wide use, there is no commonly used definition for ‘civil unrest’. The term does not feature in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, although related terms, such as riot, terrorism, protest and violent disorder are defined in some national legislation. The United Kingdom’s (1986) Public Order Act (United Kingdom Government, 1986), for example, defines riot and violent disorder. Academic and non-legal definitions are available, as outlined below. Some authors emphasise the explicit non-state affiliation in their definition of ‘civil’ unrest, while others are less clear about the state and non-state contribution. An important distinction is that civil unrest is largely understood to take place in times of peace (Kalyvas, 2000), although not exclusively as noted below by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Instances of civil unrest can take place over short or long timeframes, and are widely although not exclusively, understood to be urban acts (Kalyvas, 2000). While acts such as peaceful protests can have no or relatively minimal disturbance, violent riots can result in deaths, destruction of property and infrastructure (Evans, 1993; Braha, 2012). In the case of civil unrest in Los Angeles in 1992, for example, violence resulted in 53 deaths, 2325 reported injuries and more than USD 735 million in damage to buildings (Evans, 1993). Civil unrest is generally understood to include violent and non-violent group acts such as riots, protest, isolated and sporadic acts of violence (Braha, 2012; Lawand, 2012; Basedau et al., 2018). The perceived or actual motivation for the act is often emphasised when describing collective action as civil unrest, alongside a clash with authority (Ramakrishnan et al., 2014). Frequently cited explanations include tension or dissatisfaction over political, economic or social changes/conditions (Kalyvas, 2000). According to Basedau et al. (2018:5) ‘One can conceptualize civil unrest as a special form of collective action and people need to be motivated and able to exert it.’ Braha (2012) defined civil unrest as a ‘form of collective human dynamics, which has led to major transitions of societies in modern history’, while Oncevay et al. (2020) defined it as ‘public manifestations, where people demonstrate their position for different causes’. Kalyvas (2000:3) defined civil unrest as “a term that includes limited political violence (such as acts of ‘terrorism’, individual assassinations, etc.), sporadic violent collective action (such as riots), or nonviolent and mildly violent collective action (such as protests, demonstrations, etc.) – all of which tend to take place in times of peace.” In contrast, according to Melzer (2009), as part of guidance from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on International Humanitarian Law, civil unrest can also take place in times of armed conflict, and can be contextualised as follows: “During armed conflict, political demonstrations, riots, and other forms of civil unrest are often marked by high levels of violence and are sometimes responded to with military force. In fact, civil unrest may well result in death, injury and destruction and, ultimately, may even benefit the general war effort of a party to the conflict by undermining the territorial authority and control of another party through political pressure, economic insecurity, destruction and disorder. It is therefore important to distinguish direct participation in hostilities – which is specifically designed to support a party to an armed conflict against another – from violent forms of civil unrest, the primary purpose of which is to express dissatisfaction with the territorial or detaining authorities.”" ] }, "broader": { "id": "http://connectivity-hub.com/terms/5ef45c3b-60ab-4e1a-933d-f55c34f90105", "prefLabel": { "en": "Conflict" } }, "inScheme": [ { "id": "http://connectivity-hub.com/terms/", "title": { "en": "Climate Connectivity Taxonomy" } } ], "inSchemeAll": [ { "id": "http://connectivity-hub.com/terms/" } ], "@context": { "@version": 1.1, "id": "@id", "type": "@type", "@vocab": "http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#", "xsd": "http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#", "dct": "http://purl.org/dc/terms/", "dc": "http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/", "schema": "https://schema.org/", "vann": "http://purl.org/vocab/vann/", "ldp": "http://www.w3.org/ns/ldp#", "owl": "http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#", "title": { "@id": "dct:title", "@container": "@language" }, "dc:title": { "@id": "dc:title", "@container": "@language" }, "dc:description": { "@id": "dc:description", "@container": "@language" }, "description": { "@id": "dct:description", "@container": "@language" }, "license": { "@id": "dct:license", "@container": "@language" }, "issued": { "@id": "dct:issued", "@type": "xsd:date" }, "created": { "@id": "dct:created", "@type": "xsd:date" }, "modified": { "@id": "dct:modified", "@type": "xsd:date" }, "creator": "dct:creator", "publisher": "dct:publisher", "preferredNamespacePrefix": "vann:preferredNamespacePrefix", "preferredNamespaceUri": "vann:preferredNamespaceUri", "isBasedOn": "schema:isBasedOn", "source": "dct:source", "prefLabel": { "@container": "@language" }, "altLabel": { "@container": [ "@language", "@set" ] }, "hiddenLabel": { "@container": [ "@language", "@set" ] }, "definition": { "@container": "@language" }, "note": { "@container": [ "@language", "@set" ] }, "changeNote": { "@container": [ "@language", "@set" ] }, "editorialNote": { "@container": [ "@language", "@set" ] }, "historyNote": { "@container": [ "@language", "@set" ] }, "scopeNote": { "@container": [ "@language", "@set" ] }, "notation": { "@container": "@set" }, "example": { "@container": "@language" }, "narrower": { "@container": "@set" }, "related": { "@container": "@set" }, "relatedMatch": { "@container": "@set" }, "narrowerTransitive": { "@container": "@set" }, "broaderTransitive": { "@container": "@set" }, "broadMatch": { "@container": "@set" }, "narrowMatch": { "@container": "@set" }, "closeMatch": { "@container": "@set" }, "exactMatch": { "@container": "@set" }, "hasTopConcept": { "@container": "@set" }, "inScheme": { "@container": "@set" }, "topConceptOf": { "@container": "@set" }, "deprecated": { "@id": "owl:deprecated", "@type": "xsd:boolean" }, "isReplacedBy": { "@id": "dct:isReplacedBy", "@container": "@set" } } }