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# After St Paul's: the smoke this time
- URL: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/after-st-pauls-smoke-this-time/
- Published: 2011-11-01T05:11:36.000Z
- Updated: 2019-02-14T22:13:27.000Z
- Description: An encampment around St Paul’s cathedral in London casts a new light on this icon of British wartime defiance. But the epic days of the 1940s may have something to teach the protesters in return, says David Hayes.
- Author: David Hayes
- Tags: Europe, #Migrated, Politics & activism, United Kingdom, democracy & power, openglobalrights-openpage-blog, Democracy and government, Occupy!, politics of protest, International politics, UK, #en, #Import 2026-04-09 17:19

A famous photograph of St Paul’s cathedral in London shows the great dome of Christopher Wren’s late 17th-century masterpiece rising proudly [above](http://www.worldsfamousphotos.com/index.php/2007/04/05/st-pauls-cathedral-during-the-blitz-1940/?ref=opendemocracy.net) the smoke of the *Luftwaffe’s* rain of fire during the intense bombardment of the city on 29 December 1940 - a living architectural symbol of civic and national resistance to an existential threat.

Seven decades on, the extraordinary protest encampment that has been [occupying](http://occupylsx.org/?ref=opendemocracy.net) the vicinity of St Paul’s since 15 October 2011 is casting a more unforgiving light on the cathedral and its [place](http://www.stpauls.co.uk/Cathedral-History?ref=opendemocracy.net) at the heart of Britain’s iconography. But the epic days of the 1940s may have something to teach it in return.

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