Directed by Greg Elmer & Andy Opel ∙ Canada - France - United States ∙ 2014

PREEMPTING DISSENT, a documentary released under a creative commons license, builds upon the book of the same name written by Greg Elmer and Andy Opel. The film is a culmination of a collaborative process of soliciting, collecting and editing multimedia content from people around the world.

PREEMPTING DISSENT interrogates the expansion of the so-called “Miami model” of protest policing strategies, a set of strategies developed in the wake of 9/11 to preempt forms of mass protest at major events in the U.S. and worldwide. The film tracks the development of the Miami model after the 1999 World Trade Organization (WTO) protests in Seattle, through the post-9/11 years—from the demonstrations at the Third Summit of the Americas, to the G8 and G20 summits, and the Occupy Wall Street movement.

PREEMPTING DISSENT exposes the political, social, and economic roots of preemptive forms of protest policing, and their manifestations in spatial tactics: the deployment of so-called ‘less-lethal’ weapons, and surveillance regimes. In response to these tactics, new social movements have begun to adopt their own preemptive tactics so as not to fall into the trap set for them by police agencies worldwide.

All proceeds generated from the streaming of this video are split between the artists/rights holder and Cinema Politica. To find out more visit cinemapolitica.org.