Academy Of Ideas

From controversial law cases such as that of the footballer Ched Evans through to intense bursts of outrage at offensive jokes or unpopular opinions, the Twitterstorm seems to have replaced the mob in twenty-first-century imagination. While some defend the use of such tactics as a (mostly) harmless letting off of steam, others have become increasingly uncomfortable about what such tactics mean for the state of public debate more widely. In his much-discussed book, So You’ve Been Publically Shamed, journalist Jon Ronson explored the real-world effects of such vituperative mob justice, from unfairly destroying reputations to ruining lives: last year, an investigation into ‘trolls’ targeting the parents of Madeleine McCann ended in the suicide of one of the accused. From psychologist Gustave le Bon’s 1895 work, The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind, to Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, and even behavioural economics, there has been no shortage of intellectual inquiry into the nature of mobs, y