From pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong to far-right and anti-Trump marches in the US, protests occur daily in public spaces worldwide – but can we measure which city has the most?

From the racially charged marches in Charlottesville to anti-nuclear demonstrations in Tokyo, tens of thousands of protests are mounted daily in the public spaces of the world’s cities. Streets are closed, meetings convened and in the worst cases, people are beaten, jailed or killed.

“There is a palpable sense that the number of demonstrations worldwide is increasing, but nobody really knows,” says prof Donatella della Porta of the Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Scuala Normala Superiore in Florence. “It is notable, however, that there seem to be more right-wing protests.”

There is no single database collating official information on demonstrations in different global cities. Automated systems such as the Google Jigsaw-supported Global Data on Events Language and Tone project and the Integrated Crisis Early Warning System trawl the web for information on protests, but research has shown they fall short when tested for reliability, often failing to record the same events.

After the Guardian contacted police forces around the world, a likely candidate for the city with the most demonstrations is Hong Kong. As the city state struggles to maintain its autonomy from Beijing, authorities recorded 11,854 public assemblies and 1,304 public processions in 2016.

Hong Kong requires permits for all public assemblies of more than 50 people and processions of more than 30 people, so it is not clear how many of these are actually protests. But the steep rise from 6,029 in 2015 to 13,158 in 2016 seems to indicate that many of these permits are political demonstrations.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The disappearance of 43 Mexican students in 2014 sparked mass protests in Mexico City. Photograph: Eduardo Verdugo/AP

Of the cities that answered the Guardian’s request for official data, Mexico City had the second highest number of protests. The Mexico City General Directorate of Public Security reported 7,011 demonstrations in 2016 down from 9,111 demonstrations in 2014.

Many demonstrations here are an intrinsic part of political negotiation, organised by groups such as the teachers’ union and squatters’ rights organisation, Antorcha Campesina. Protesters have even been known to hire people who will demonstrate in their place if they have other commitments.

Many South Africans believe their country has the most protests, according to independent researcher David Bruce in Johannesburg. An analysis of Bruce’s data, and a study on police reports of protests by the University of Johannesburg, estimates there were between 3-4,000 demonstrations in the metro area in the 12 months to March 2016. Although it is not nearly enough to make Johannesburg the city with the most demonstrations worldwide, South Africa is on a rising curve – with police reporting 14,693 protests nationwide in 2015/2016, up from 12,058 in 2011/2012.



The undisputed European champion of protest is Berlin, with approximately 5,000 demonstrations in 2016, according to the city’s senate department of the interior. Protests included pro and anti-refugee marches, neo-Nazi demonstrations, left-wing May Day marches and protests against the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.

Madrid saw 1,983 protests in the first nine months of 2016, according to El País, down from a 2013 peak of 4,354 at the height of the anti-austerity movement.



The Hague saw 1,500 demonstrations in 2016, five times as many as in 2002, according to Dutch daily AD. The newspaper attributed the rise to the increasing polarisation of Dutch society. A spokeswoman for the city of Amsterdam said demonstrations had more than doubled there over the past four years. The city has 400 recorded so far in 2017.

Meanwhile, Paris police reported 2,383 demonstrations in 2016. The French capital also spiked in 2013, driven by demonstrations by the anti-gay marriage Manif pour tous and the Occupy-inspired Nuit debout. Police said the number of protests fell after the November 2015 terror attacks.



The number of protests also fell in Athens. The city saw 1,134 demonstrations in 2016, compared to 1,594 in 2013, according to the Hellenic Police Register. Most were directed against austerity.

Sydney, Australia had 405 demonstrations in 2016 – including protests against the lockout laws which enforce early closing hours on bars.



Other cities – including London and New York – did not reply to the Guardian’s requests for information.

According to the Crowd Counting Consortium, a project dedicated to estimating crowds and protests in the United States, 54.5% of all the demonstrations they registered in 2017 were in opposition to president Donald Trump. Washington DC police reported 964 protests in 2016, and 731 by early August this year.

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Although many cities – including Berlin, Mexico City and Paris – require permits for demonstrations, others such as Amsterdam only require that organisers notify the authorities. Not registering a demonstration can be a form of protest in itself.



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