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This book presents a strong and original argument about English nationalism and the ways in which it is currently transforming British politics.
List of contents
- Introduction: Englishness and the New British Politics
- 1: England Speaks: The 2015 UK General Election and the 2016 EU Referendum
- 2: On Englishness and Britishness
- 3: The English on England and the UK
- 4: The English on Britain in the World
- 5: The English World View
- 6: England, Scotland, and Wales Compared
- 7: Accommodating England
- 8: Analysing England
About the author
Ailsa Henderson is Professor of Political Science at the University of Edinburgh and the co-author of The National Question and Electoral Politics in Quebec and Scotland (with É Bélanger, R Nadeau, E Hepburn, McGill-Queen's University Press, 2018).
Richard Wyn Jones is Professor of Welsh Politics and Dean of Public Affairs at Cardiff University. He is the co-author of Wales Says Yes: Welsh Devolution and the 2011 Referendum (with R Scully, University of Wales Press, 2012).
Summary
Until the Brexit referendum, there was widespread doubt as to whether English nationalism existed at all, at least beyond a small fringe. Since then, it has come to be regarded an obvious explanation for the vote to Leave the European Union. Subsequent opinion polls have raised doubts about the extent of continuing English commitment to the Union of the United Kingdom itself. Yet even as Englishness is apparently reshaping Britain's place in world and perhaps, ultimately, the state itself, it remains poorly understood.
In this book Ailsa Henderson and Richard Wyn Jones draw on data from the Future of England Survey, a specially commissioned public attitudes survey programme exploring the political implications of English identity, to make new and original arguments about the nature of English nationalism.
They demonstrate that English nationalism is emphatically not a rejection of Britain and Britishness. Rather, English nationalism combines a sense of grievance about England's place within the United Kingdom with a fierce commitment to a particular vision of Britain's past, present, and future. Understanding its Janus-faced nature - both England and Britain - is key not only to understanding English nationalism, but also to understanding the ways in which it is transforming British politics.
Additional text
The politics of England and the UK have been transformed in the past 20 years. This book makes a powerful case that the politics of Englishness, a force largely overlooked by academics and commentators, has been at the heart of those changes.
