Contrary to the long-standing assumption that emergency bystanders are apathetic and non-
involved, accumulating evidence shows that bystander intervention is the norm in violently
dangerous public conflicts. However, it is currently uncertain to what extent this result
generalizes to everyday public disputes with a low level of danger. Here, we address this gap
by analyzing bystander reactions to incidents where bus passengers with invalid tickets dispute
being fined by a ticket inspector. Data were videos clips of incidents recorded by the inspectors’
occupational body-worn cameras. Our preliminary results showed that in around half of the
incidents, a bystander intervened in the inspector-passenger conflict. The intervention
behaviors were mainly verbal in nature, with only one in five having a physical aspect.
Although the current intervention rate is lower than previously reported in high-danger
contexts, our results add to the understanding that bystanders often play an active role in
shaping public conflicts. We discuss implications for theory of bystander behavior in rule
enforcement situations and advocate that scholars use video observational methods to
examine bystanders across real-life conflicts with varying danger levels.