We use speech act theory to study the U.K. state’s response to large-scale public disorder across English cities in August 2011. This historical case has practical implications for understanding how nation states address other crises—because we explain in detail how the discourse of powerful state actors restores order. Drawing on parliamentary debate, Select Committee testimony, and interviews with police officers, our contribution is to describe and analyze how this happened contemporaneously at different levels. At street level, this involved the reassertion of sovereignty through territorial struggles by the police. At what we call “state level,” speech act theory helps us show how Members of Parliament framed the disorder and participants in ways that supported the reestablishment of norms and of order; principally through homogenization, in a process we describe as “tidying.”

中文翻译：

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危机期间国家如何恢复秩序？英国应对 2011 年 8 月“骚乱”的经验教训

我们使用言语行为理论研究了 2011 年 8 月英国政府对英国城市大规模公共混乱的反应。这个历史案例对于理解民族国家如何应对其他危机具有实际意义——因为我们详细解释了强大国家的话语如何演员恢复秩序。利用议会辩论、特别委员会的证词和对警察的采访，我们的贡献是描述和分析这在不同级别同时发生的情况。在街道一级，这涉及通过警察的领土斗争来重申主权。在我们所说的“国家层面”，言语行为理论帮助我们展示国会议员如何以支持重建规范和秩序的方式构建混乱和参与者；主要是通过同质化，