The Return of ‘Englishness’ inBritish Political Culture – The End of the Unions?

Abstract

AbstractThis article approaches the interpretation of elite and popular attitudes towards theUnitedKingdom's membership of theEuropeanUnion through analysis of some of the rival perspectives on the national identity of theEnglish that have become increasingly salient during the last two decades. It highlights their role as sources of some of the most influential ideas about nationhood, governance and state now shaping public discourse on theUK's membership of theEU. These include radical‐democratic, restorationist andAnglo‐British forms of patriotic discourse, which have prompted and responded to the growing prevalence of England as ‘an imagined community’ – a trend which has rendered other circles of attachment to theUKand Europe more tenuous and distant. A central conclusion of the article is that these emerging perspectives have spawned webs of belief that connect new and old ideas of nationhood to the political judgements that different actors are making about theEU.