It is just before 9pm on a mild July night in the seaside town of Southport, outside Liverpool.
Chanaka Balasuriya, owner of the Windsor Mini Mart, is at home anxiously watching a live video feed from the CCTV camera outside his shop a few blocks away. A crowd — mostly young men, all of them white — is gathering outside the store.
This is supposedly a protest. There are few placards to explain the cause, but the slogans about immigrants and Muslims are unmistakable.
Forty-seven-year-old Balasuriya, originally from Sri Lanka, has lived in Southport for more than half his life. He is neither an undocumented migrant nor a Muslim — though that should not matter. The mob, however, is in a violent mood. Witnesses later say they targeted his shop because he “was not like them” — because he symbolised their anger.
The crowd claims to be seeking “revenge” for the horrific stabbing of three young girls at a local dance studio the day before.
Rubbish is tipped into the road and set alight. Makeshift missiles are hurled. Some rioters begin smashing the steel roller door of the Mini Mart. It takes about 10 minutes to break in. Before police reinforcements arrive, the store is ransacked. According to a BBC report, around £10,000 worth of cigarettes, alcohol and other goods is stolen.
Similar scenes play out across England. Mosques are attacked. A hotel housing migrants is besieged for hours and nearly set alight. Cars — including police vehicles — are torched. The unrest is fuelled by a toxic mix of nativist ideology and false information circulating on social media.
There is bitter irony in the fact that many of the rioters travelled in from other towns and cities.
But then something remarkable happens the next morning.
Communities affected by the violence come out onto the streets and begin picking up the pieces — literally.
Balasuriya receives a call urging him to come quickly to his shop. When he arrives, he finds local residents with brooms and shovels clearing debris, tidying the store and repacking what remains of his stock. Local tradesmen offer to repair the damaged shopfront free of charge.
Rose Tucker, who owns a beauty salon across the road, starts a GoFundMe campaign that raises £3,000 in just a few hours to help him restock. Neighbours tell reporters that Balasuriya and his family are warm and kind.
“It’s the local corner shop, and we’re quite a tight-knit community around here,” Tucker says.
Similar stories emerge elsewhere. The pattern repeats: communities gather to help, restore and defend the businesses and faith centres caught up in the violence.
Much of this feels familiar. South Africans know all too well the trauma of political unrest and how quickly hateful slogans and misinformation can ignite it.
But the real lesson here is about community, not conflict.
Businesses — from corner stores to multinationals — do not exist in a vacuum. They are rooted in physical places. Their fortunes are often tied to the towns and suburbs where their workers and customers live, even if their owners are shareholders on the other side of the world. Their supply chains, network cables and brands run through the streets of real communities.
Corporate social responsibility, in a formal sense, may shape public perception. But it remains corporate — and it is not always accessible to every business.
What matters just as much is social cohesion.
Businesses have a role to play in building it. Private enterprises, large and small, often have far more influence over local life than the public sector.
Yes, companies may be required to tick boxes on government forms. But they should not put people in boxes.
Businesses that are embedded in their communities — that share local aspirations and show genuine care — are businesses communities will defend and value.
