British nationalism

Last updated August 22, 2024

British nationalism asserts that the British are a nation and promotes the cultural unity of Britons,^[1]^[2] in a definition of Britishness that may include people of English, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish descent (those living in both Northern Ireland and Great Britain and historically the whole of Ireland when it was within the United Kingdom).^[3] British nationalism is closely associated with British unionism, which seeks to uphold the political union that is the United Kingdom, or strengthen the links between the countries of the United Kingdom.^[4]

British nationalism's unifying identity descends from the ancient Britons who dwelt on the island of Great Britain.^[2] British nationalism grew to include people outside Great Britain, in Ireland, because of the 1542 Crown of Ireland Act, which declared that the crown of Ireland was to be held by the ruling monarch of England as well as Anglo-Irish calls for unity with Britain.^[5]

It is characterised as a "powerful but ambivalent force in British politics".^[6] In its moderate form, British nationalism has been a civic nationalism, emphasizing both cohesion and diversity of the people of the United Kingdom, its dependencies, and its former colonies.^[7] However, nativist nationalism has arisen based on fears relating to immigration; this anti-immigrant nativist nationalism has manifested politically in the British National Party and other nativist nationalist movements.^[7] Politicians, such as former British prime minister David Cameron, have sought to promote British nationalism as a progressive cause.^[8]

Nationalism and unionism

Nowadays, as in the past, unionist movements exist in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. These movements seek specifically to retain the ties between those areas and the rest of the UK, in opposition to civic nationalist movements. Such unionist movements include the Ulster Unionist Party, Democratic Unionist Party and the Scottish Unionist Party. In Scotland and Wales the Conservative, Labour, Liberal Democrat, and Reform UK support the Union. British nationalists are generally supportive of unionism.

List of British nationalist parties

Related Research Articles

The 2001 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 7 June 2001, four years after the previous election on 1 May 1997, to elect 659 members to the House of Commons. The governing Labour Party led by the prime minister Tony Blair was re-elected to serve a second term in government with another landslide victory with a 165-seat majority, returning 412 members of Parliament versus 418 from the previous election, a net loss of six seats, although with a significantly lower turnout than before—59.4%, compared to 71.6% at the previous election.

The United Kingdom is a constitutional monarchy which, by legislation and convention, operates as a unitary parliamentary democracy. A hereditary monarch, currently King Charles III, serves as head of state while the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, currently Sir Keir Starmer since 2024, serves as the elected head of government.

Loyalism, in the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and its former colonies, refers to the allegiance to the British crown or the United Kingdom. In North America, the most common usage of the term refers to loyalty to the British Crown, notably with the loyalists opponents of the American Revolution, and United Empire Loyalists who moved to other colonies in British North America after the revolution.

Unionism in Ireland is a political tradition that professes loyalty to the crown of the United Kingdom and to the union it represents with England, Scotland and Wales. The overwhelming sentiment of Ireland's Protestant minority, unionism mobilised in the decades following Catholic Emancipation in 1829 to oppose restoration of a separate Irish parliament. Since Partition in 1921, as Ulster unionism its goal has been to retain Northern Ireland as a devolved region within the United Kingdom and to resist the prospect of an all-Ireland republic. Within the framework of the 1998 Belfast Agreement, which concluded three decades of political violence, unionists have shared office with Irish nationalists in a reformed Northern Ireland Assembly. As of February 2024, they no longer do so as the larger faction: they serve in an executive with an Irish republican First Minister.

The October 1974 United Kingdom general election took place on Thursday 10 October 1974 to elect 635 members of the House of Commons. It was the second general election held that year; the first year that two general elections were held in the same year since 1910; and the first time that two general elections were held less than a year apart from each other since the 1923 and 1924 elections, which took place 10 months apart.

Irish nationalism is a nationalist political movement which, in its broadest sense, asserts that the people of Ireland should govern Ireland as a sovereign state. Since the mid-19th century, Irish nationalism has largely taken the form of cultural nationalism based on the principles of national self-determination and popular sovereignty. Irish nationalists during the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries such as the United Irishmen in the 1790s, Young Irelanders in the 1840s, the Fenian Brotherhood during the 1880s, Fianna Fáil in the 1920s, and Sinn Féin styled themselves in various ways after French left-wing radicalism and republicanism. Irish nationalism celebrates the culture of Ireland, especially the Irish language, literature, music, and sports. It grew more potent during the period in which all of Ireland was part of the United Kingdom, which led to most of the island gaining independence from the UK in 1922.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">North Down (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom, 1950 onwards

North Down is a parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom House of Commons. The current MP is Alex Easton, elected at the 2024 United Kingdom general election.

Unionism in Scotland is a political movement which favours the continuation of the political union between Scotland and the other countries of the United Kingdom, and hence is opposed to Scottish independence. Scotland is one of four countries of the United Kingdom which has its own devolved government and Scottish Parliament, as well as representation in the UK Parliament. There are many strands of political Unionism in Scotland, some of which have ties to Unionism and Loyalism in Northern Ireland. The two main political parties in the UK — the Conservatives and Labour — both support Scotland remaining part of the UK.

The Irish Unionist Alliance (IUA), also known as the Irish Unionist Party, Irish Unionists or simply the Unionists, was a unionist political party founded in Ireland in 1891 from a merger of the Irish Conservative Party and the Irish Loyal and Patriotic Union (ILPU) to oppose plans for home rule for Ireland within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The party was led for much of its existence by Colonel Edward James Saunderson and later by St John Brodrick, 1st Earl of Midleton. In total, eighty-six members of the House of Lords affiliated themselves with the Irish Unionist Alliance, although its broader membership among Irish voters outside Ulster was relatively small.

The 2005 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 5 May 2005, to elect 646 members to the House of Commons. The governing Labour Party led by the prime minister Tony Blair won its third consecutive victory, with Blair becoming the second Labour leader after Harold Wilson to form three majority governments. However, its majority fell to 66 seats; the majority it won four years earlier had been of 167 seats. The UK media interpreted the results as an indicator of a breakdown in trust in the government, and especially in Blair.

Ulster nationalism is a minor school of thought in the politics of Northern Ireland that seeks the independence of Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom without joining the Republic of Ireland, thereby becoming an independent sovereign state separate from both.

English independence is a political stance advocating secession of England from the United Kingdom. Support for secession of England has been influenced by the increasing devolution of political powers to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, where independence from the United Kingdom is a prominent subject of political debate.

The Buckingham Palace Conference, sometimes referred to as the Buckingham Palace Conference on Ireland, was a conference called in Buckingham Palace in 1914 by King George V to which the leaders of Irish Nationalism, John Redmond and Irish Unionism Edward Carson, were invited to discuss plans to introduce Irish Home Rule and avert a feared civil war on the issue. The King's initiative brought the leaders of Nationalism and Unionism together for the first time in a conference.

Independent Unionist has been a label sometimes used by candidates in elections in the United Kingdom, indicating a support for British unionism.

The 2009 European Parliament election was the United Kingdom's component of the 2009 European Parliament election, the voting for which was held on Thursday 4 June 2009. The election was held concurrently with the 2009 local elections in England. In total, 72 Members of the European Parliament were elected from the United Kingdom using proportional representation.

In the United Kingdom, unionism is a political stance favouring the continued unity of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as one sovereign state, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Those who support the union are referred to as Unionists. Though not all unionists are nationalists, UK or British unionism is associated with British nationalism, which asserts that the British are a nation and promotes the cultural unity of the Britons, which may include people of English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Cornish, Jersey, Manx and Guernsey descent.

Separatism in the United Kingdom may refer to the secession of any of the countries of the United Kingdom from the union. Less significant movements for separatism exist such as Cornwall within England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Politics of Northern Ireland</span>

Since 1998, Northern Ireland has devolved government within the United Kingdom. The government and Parliament of the United Kingdom are responsible for reserved and excepted matters. Reserved matters are a list of policy areas, which the Westminster Parliament may devolve to the Northern Ireland Assembly at some time in future. Excepted matters are never expected to be considered for devolution. On all other matters, the Northern Ireland Executive together with the 90-member Northern Ireland Assembly may legislate and govern for Northern Ireland. Additionally, devolution in Northern Ireland is dependent upon participation by members of the Northern Ireland Executive in the North/South Ministerial Council, which co-ordinates areas of co-operation between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

References

Notes

↑ Motyl 2001, pp. 62–63.
1 2 Guntram H. Herb, David H. Kaplan. Nations and Nationalism: A Global Historical Overview: A Global Historical Overview. Santa Barbara, California, USA: ABC-CLIO, 2008.
↑ Motyl 2001, pp. 62–64.
↑ Miller 2005 , p. 133.
↑ Brendan Bradshaw, Peter Roberts. British Consciousness and Identity: The Making of Britain, 1533-1707. P. 302.
↑ Smith, Smith & White 1988 , p. 61.
1 2 Motyl 2001, pp. 64.
↑ Conservative Party leader David Cameron advocates liberal or civic British nationalism: "Cameron: I will never take Scotland for granted". Conservatives. 15 September 2006. Archived from the original on 24 September 2012. Being British is one of the most successful examples of inclusive civic nationalism in the world. The official party site.

Bibliography

Miller, William Lockley (2005), "Anglo-Scottish Relations from 1900 to Devolution and Beyond", Proceedings of the British Academy, 128, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-726331-0
Motyl, Alexander J. (2001). Encyclopedia of Nationalism, Volume II. Academic Press. ISBN 0-12-227230-7.
Smith, Michael; Smith, Steve; White, Brian (1988), British foreign policy: tradition, change, and transformation, Routledge, ISBN 978-0-04-327081-3

External links

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[FOOTNOTEMotyl200162–63-1] Motyl 2001, pp. 62–63.

[Guntram_H._Herb_2008-2] 1 2 Guntram H. Herb, David H. Kaplan. Nations and Nationalism: A Global Historical Overview: A Global Historical Overview. Santa Barbara, California, USA: ABC-CLIO, 2008.

[FOOTNOTEMotyl200162–64-3] Motyl 2001, pp. 62–64.

[Mil133-4] Miller 2005 , p. 133.

[5] Brendan Bradshaw, Peter Roberts. British Consciousness and Identity: The Making of Britain, 1533-1707. P. 302.

[6] Smith, Smith & White 1988 , p. 61.

[FOOTNOTEMotyl200164-7] 1 2 Motyl 2001, pp. 64.

[8] Conservative Party leader David Cameron advocates liberal or civic British nationalism: "Cameron: I will never take Scotland for granted". Conservatives. 15 September 2006. Archived from the original on 24 September 2012. Being British is one of the most successful examples of inclusive civic nationalism in the world. The official party site.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

[8]