Worn with pride

Hackney Museum’s radical stories of protests told through badges

By Giada Pasqualini, Hackney Museum

‘Afia will stay!’ badge, 2024.45 © Hackney Museum

As part of an ambitious project to re-display Hackney Museum’s permanent exhibition, the museum is researching its collection of over 380 campaign badges from the late 20th century linked to local activism. 

From the 1970s onwards, the borough was a hotbed of social and political organising on a truly vast amount of issues. Campaign badges were an important tool of communication, with individuals often wearing numerous badges to show what causes they supported, developing large personal collections.

Residents united to protest and campaign against the struggles their communities were facing, while also showing support and solidarity with global causes. These issues included high unemployment, the miners’ strikes, budget cuts for the NHS, the closure of local hospitals and nuclear threats. 

Local communities took to the streets in crowds, voicing slogans, waving banners and wearing badges. These objects reveal personal stories and memories, and at the same time they reflect the cultural, political and economic changes taking place.

‘Save the Reservoirs’ badge, 2023.37 © Hackney Museum

The ‘Save the Reservoirs’ campaign was initiated by a group of local people living in Stoke Newington and Woodberry Down in response to Thames Water’s plans to sell and develop over the much-loved green area. 

The campaign lasted over a decade – from 1986 to 1999 – and included committee meetings, newsletters, fundraising and demonstrations, a collection that has been added to the collections at Hackney Archives (ref. 2006/03). This resulted in the successful retention of the reservoirs and the opening of Woodberry Wetlands, by Sir David Attenborough, in 2016.

‘Fight Corrie Bill’ badge, 2024.103 © Hackney Museum

In 1979 the proposed ‘Corrie Bill’ sought to restrict the abortion rights that had been granted under the 1967 Abortion Act. 

A campaign protesting the legislation brought together women’s organisations, trade unions and community groups, and saw many Hackney women and men take part in demonstrations and letter writing. 

All three Hackney MPs voted against the proposal and the bill was eventually dropped.

 ‘Scrap SUS now’ badge, 2024.105 © Hackney Museum

The ‘sus’ law allowed the police to stop and search a ‘suspected’ person, leading to the unfair targeting of African heritage and other global majority youngsters in the area. 

In the late 1970s Mavis Best and a group of Lewisham women launched a successful campaign for the scrapping of the law.