By free, one has to mean that our several peoples are free from major overt intimidation in respect of opinion, association, assembly, publication, peaceful demonstration and travel. By world standards we are, in respect of freedom, 'in the black'.
But, by standards acceptable to concerned persons, ours is a seriously undemocratic society; in this respect we are 'in the red'. There is a democratic deficit in the UK arising mainly from two causes - from the simple majority principle whereby MP's are elected and also from the absence of a definitive constitution.
The results of these defects in our governance are important. They include the effective disfranchisement of minority voters living in any of the hundreds of 'safe seats', the fact of years of Parliamentary majorities being based upon a global minority of votes cast, and a widespread feeling of powerlessness arising from the notion that we live under what Lord Hailsham has described as an elective dictatorship about which we can do very little from day to day.
The reality of elective dictatorship is revealed by the pained noises made by near-minority governments who cannot get their wishes nodded through the House and who, therefore, have to resort to trying to convince enough Members to vote for what is on offer. A set-up in which 'whipping' is the cosy norm (and rational persuasion is the irritating exception) is scarcely democratic. The irony is that the three main parties have remarkably similar ideas and so there should be no difficulty in getting broadly acceptable legislation (albeit perhaps not worthy of acceptance) through the House. There is, politically, a democratic deficit indeed.
In Scotland there has also been, for centuries but perhaps soon to be remedied, a deficit of an altogether different order - a constitutional deficit. Scotland is, perhaps, the only country with recognised and enforceable laws of its own but with no legislature of its own. Quite an amazing anomaly !
In Scotland, this democratic double deficit very often leaves concerned people with little option but to consider taking direct action. Our real freedom permits this; our illusory democracy does nothing to discourage it. The big issue for direct activists is about violence/non-violence. There is no easy resolution of this issue; the idea that violence is acceptable merely on the premise that 'the end justifies the means' repels most of us but, equally, pure non-violence is not enough for people who want results that go beyond gestures and perhaps personal martyrdom. Violence is, like many things, objectionable - other things being equal. The trouble with the real world is that 'other things' are very rarely equal and to be violent, or not to be violent, is a complex question.
It has to be said that non-violence should be the norm and departure from it should be a course of last resort. Some of the classical criteria for waging 'just war' are relevant to the question of violence in many other connections: 1) try to exhaust peaceful means first, 2) don't start a showdown you can't expect to win and 3) use minimum force. (The other classical criterion is unlikely to be relevant to green activism - 4) treat your defeated enemy with magnanimity).
Practically there are serious objections to using violence even to achieve good ends: a good cause is damaged if its promotion actually frightens, hurts or bereaves people. More than enough human hurt is done in the name of bad causes; the promoters of good ones do well not to add to human suffering.
There is also the fact that to contest an issue violently must, of necessity, distract attention from that issue and divert attention to questions of 'who started it' 'law and order' and all the rest.
We must face the fact that direct action is, in principle, necessitated by the democratic deficit but that, while violence should not be excluded absolutely, any non-violent options open to concerned persons should be exploited to the full. Police, like the rest of us, are people with an interest in a greener world.