It is probable that most British ‘statesmen’, politicians or functionaries, would politely distance themselves from Weber's famous characterisation of the state – possessor of the monopoly of force in a political community – as being both too theoretical and too foreign for our case. In modern times, at least, the British state has clothed itself in a comfortably shapeless outfit which has served to disguise its fundamental powers. But it has differed little from any other modern state in its determination to vindicate its monopoly of force, and in reacting to violent challenges it has provided at least an oblique definition of itself. A battery of legislation, including two major Public Order Acts and a dynasty of Emergency Powers Acts, together with Race Relations Acts, an Incitement to Disaffection Act, a Treachery Act and the Prevention of Terrorism Act, bears testimony to the uncongenial fact that the legitimacy of the state's monopoly of force has been contested at many levels and in many areas during the course of this century. If there is still no consolidated law of civil emergency, no definition of public order or public security, no ‘state of siege’, this is due at least as much to the ingrained common law tradition of resistance to codification as to the fact that political violence has so far – just about – been contained by this loose legal skein.