Dr Tabitha Baker
Senior Lecturer in Politics, Bournemouth University. Tabitha researches national identity and political sentiment in periods of change and crisis, with a specific interest in coastal and rural regions. Her disciplinary approach consists of qualitative social and political psychology.
Email: talicebaker@bournemouth.ac.uk
X: @DrTABaker
UK Election 2024
Section 3: The nations and regions
25. Have voters fallen out of love with the SNP? (Dr Lynn Bennie)
26. The spectre of Sturgeon still looms large in gendered coverage in Scotland (Melody House, Dr Fiona McKay)
27. The personalisation of Scottish politics in a UK General Election (Dr Michael Higgins, Dr Maike Dinger)
28. Competence, change and continuity: a tale of two nations (Dr Will Kitson)
29. Election success, but problems remain for Labour in Wales (Dr Nye Davies)
30. Four ways in which Northern Ireland’s own seismic results will affect the new Parliament (Prof Katy Hayward)
31. Bringing People together or pulling them apart? What Facebook ads say about the NI campaign (Dr Paul Reilly)
32. A New Dawn For Levelling Up? (Prof Arianna Giovannini)
33. Who defines Britain? National identity at the heart of the 2024 UK General Election (Dr Tabitha Baker)
Earlier this year, the Guardian reported concerns raised by Labour Party members about campaign materials produced by its headquarters for local party use. These materials prominently featured images of the Union Jack flag at the expense of traditional Labour graphics, such as the red rose logo. What might have seemed like harmless aesthetic promotional decision, instead reflected a significant cultural shift for the Labour Party, and can tell us a lot about the state of British identity politics today.
There is historical context to Labour’s traditional relationship with national symbols. The reservations that some on the Left hold with the historic use of the Union Jack as a campaigning tool by far-right parties is still palpable, as is the discomfort due to the association of the Union Jack as a symbol for colonial oppression and imperial ventures. Traditionally, the Union Jack has been the domain of the Conservative Party. But Labour officials defended the use of the Union Jack in a leaked strategy document, justifying the renewed emphasis on British values and alignment with the flag, claiming it was to target disillusioned voters. Newly elected Labour Members of Parliament such as Mike Tapp have since argued that the Union Jack has been ‘hijacked’ for right-wing purposes and that narratives of exclusionary and divisive agendas must be rejected. Such sentiments echo the articulation of a modernised Britishness under Tony Blair’s New Labour in the Cool Britannia era.
There is some credence to Tapp’s statements; it is widely acknowledged amongst social psychologists and political scientists that the nation lies at the foundation of solidarity, representing one of the strongest motives behind a large majority of political mobilisation and action. The essence of the nation is largely a psychological bond between communities of people characterised by common elements. These common elements can be a complex construct made up of several interrelated layers consisting of the ethnic, cultural, territorial, the historical and the psychological. They work to create a cohesive whole, facilitated by shared group histories, cultural or political traditions, myths, and beliefs which psychologically bind them together in what Benedict Anderson famously described as an “imagined community”. It is these elements that allow national identity, unity, and pride to become such persistent and powerful forces in modern day politics, and gives impetus to other aspects of political life, from influential movements and ideologies to compliance in paying tax.
However, national unity in Britain has faced significant challenges over the last decade and has been tested by issues such as UK devolution, increasing globalisation, Brexit and the COVID-19 pandemic. In the background of culture wars, national identity has become increasingly contentious, fuelling a rise in identity politics. Right-wing political parties have leveraged identity politics, exploiting identity conflicts as a mobilising factor by pitting groups against each other based on social and cultural values, such as national identity and immigration, rather than instrumentalising traditional economic redistribution divides.
As Sobolewska and Ford have argued in their work, these conflicts revolve around identity because they fundamentally address the ‘us’ versus ‘them’ dichotomy. They focus on differing perceptions of ‘us’, various fears and prejudices about perceived threatening outgroups (‘them’), and polarised debates about social changes that redefine who ‘we’ are and how this should evolve.
But this extends beyond Britishness, despite the changing political geography of the UK through devolution for Scotland and Wales, The Labour Party has been reluctant to adopt England’s St George’s flag in their party branding and visual communications, despite incorporating both Scottish and Welsh flags. Academic commentators have pointed out this was also evident during Keir Starmer’s entrance to Downing Street, which saw some carefully selected flags of Scotland and Wales present in the crowds; however, with no St George’s flag to be seen. This has been met with backlash from right-wing media pundits claiming that England was ‘snubbed’. Englishness as a political force is one not to be underestimated, as Henderson and Wyn-Jones have shown, English nationalism has the power to further destabilise British politics, as English resentments grow at an asymmetric devolution settlement they deem unfair. This sentiment of English national democracy, social conservatism, and hostility to immigration is a worldview which is shown to be popular by the Reform party’s significant vote share, and should not be ignored.
It is now up to the Labour Party, in power, to expand on what Britishness, and Englishness, is today. There has been a clear attempt made under Starmer’s Labour to redefine Britain, or at least, show that the party is willing to engage in Britishness. What comes out of this analysis is a clear continuity in the appeal to identity. Ultimately, the effort to reclaim the identity of a unified Britain needs to go beyond aesthetic decisions. In appealing to disillusioned groups, attention must be paid to the wider stories of loss and class de-composition in the background of long-lasting neoliberal agendas, asymmetrical devolution, and heightening economic crises, which illuminate understandings of collective identities, cohesiveness, and national solidarity in the UK.
