Recently revealed statements by former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown at the height of the banking crisis in October 2008 could give some insights into that question. An article on BBC News on September 21, 2013, drew from an explosive autobiography called Power Trip by Brown's spin doctor Damian McBride, who said the prime minister was worried that law and order could collapse during the financial crisis. McBride quoted Brown as saying:
How to deal with that threat? Brown said, "We'd have to think: do we have curfews, do we put the Army on the streets, how do we get order back?"If the banks are shutting their doors, and the cash points aren't working, and people go to Tesco [a grocery chain] and their cards aren't being accepted, the whole thing will just explode.
If you can't buy food or petrol or medicine for your kids, people will just start breaking the windows and helping themselves.
And as soon as people see that on TV, that's the end, because everyone will think that's OK now, that's just what we all have to do. It'll be anarchy. That's what could happen tomorrow.
Comment: The West remains silent on the suppression happening in Bahrain.