Shamser Sinha (London South Bank University): The traditional response from the centre and centre-left to immigration since Roy Jenkins was Home Minister through to New Labour is (1) to accept that migration can be a good thing but that (2) we need to limit it so that, race relations or more contemporaneously social cohesion, can be maintained. Both Sunder Katwala and Paul Kingsnorth agree with this despite their differences on language use. Today, this politics is prominent with Phil Woolas, Minister for Immigration, recently warning that 'It's been too easy to get into this country in the past and its going to get harder', whilst Trevor Phillips adds that immigration has fuelled 'resentments that are real and should not be dismissed - resentments felt by white, black and Asian'. However, the truth is that, if you're not an EU citizen, it's extremely hard to get into this country and that Phillips's 'real' resentments are caused more by a politics that turns human against human than by the realities of net immigration to the UK.
Immigration control is tightening. Since Labour came to power in 1997, and in a time of economic growth and the property boom, the government has instituted seven legislative acts on immigration and nationality. It has even turned doctors and nurses into immigration officials policing the legality of migrants, some of them children, in Accident and Emergency departments and GP surgeries - and not infrequently, denying them treatment. Stricter than even under the Thatcher regime, this immigration framework developed despite no tangible economic crisis existing.
Yet immigrants are supposedly a threat. If this proposition is the norm in times of economic prosperity than its political power increases in times of recession. . As Sunder observes the tightening immigration controls provide evidence that Enoch Powell did not stop anti-immigration talk or action at all. We talk about race a lot. We're not too politically correct to talk about it. We're obsessed by it. The idea that we need an 'honest' and 'democratic' debate provides cover for what Paul notes is the ugly language used by certain New Labour politicians. An ugly language based on the premise that immigration must be limited to stop the BNP. It doesn't always have to be said in ugly ways though as Anthony Giddens' snappy phrase - ''tough on immigration, but tough on the causes of hostility to immigrants' - shows. But where Paul and myself part ways is that for me, the proposition of tighter immigration control is ugly itself- no matter the language.- and based on a politics of resentment.
Phillips argues that in some parts of the country, 'the colour of disadvantage isn't black or brown. It is white'. For once, he's not wrong. He's right. But the question that this wicked formulation misses is why should we resent those with money or good jobs be they Chinese, black, brown or whatever anymore than we should resent white British people who've worked hard and done well? For Phillips it's commensense. But it's resentment. One reflection of this politics is the poisonous idea propounded by Giddens that, 'People feel stronger obligations to others when they are like themeselves'. So, we naturally feel that those like 'us' should have the money and security that is their birthright. Presumably, its also natural then if we resent 'others' not like 'us' when they have money, houses and jobs that we don't.
Hence Margaret Hodge's argument in May last year that UK citizens should have superior welfare rights to migrants. Including post war settlers from the Commonwealth and their descendents, this variation on White Rights has also been taken up the BNP in their attempts to gain electoral support from White British and non White British people by attacking new migrants and refugees. Resentment, on one level, is not based on skin colour but the fact of being an immigrant
Paul says our immigration rate is unsustainable. This is one basis for the politics of resentment that argues that 'natives' - whether old or new- should have rights that migrants don't. However, despite net immigration, the weight of migration is borne by the poorest countries least equipped to cope with it. The United Nations Refugee Agency's Statistical Yearbook for 2002 says that between 1992-2001, 86% of the world's refugees came from developing countries, whilst such countries provide asylum to 72% of the globe's refugees. Our politics of resentment creates arbitrary borders damning humanity's most vulnerable to what Agamben terms 'bare life'. If there are economic costs to bear for growing immigration- frankly we should - we have the money and technology - and if its difficult - its still the right thing to do. And if we want to curb immigration its not to border controls that we should look.
Underdevelopment provides reasons to migrate, to find a better life abroad. However, while financiers, bankers, and those lauded by Phillips as 'clever' can move themselves, their factories and their money across borders capitalising on opportunities for profit, those fleeing or seeking a better life cannot.
Underdevelopment is deeply intertwined with G8 and Chinese capitalism and its associated militarism (whether by proxy or not) from Iraq to Sierra Leone. As we exploit abroad, we destabilise and compel people to leave. The politics of resentment and Woolas's fervour to cut immigration turn neighbour against neighbour obscuring the barbaric effects of an often protectionist economic capitalism. As we hate the immigrant family next door we ignore our role in creating the unfavourable circumstances leading them to come here. Don't blame immigration. It is underdevelopment and its associated domestic politics of resentment that damage social cohesion. If we want to reduce resentment it is to underdevelopment that we must look for change.
Comments
An interesting response Shamser, with much to argue about.
For example, Giddens' 'poisonous idea' seems to me to be the basis on which British 'multiculturalism' is built - the idea that the nation is made up of separate 'communities' (the 'Asian community', the 'black community', the 'white working class', the 'Muslim community' etc etc) who have group interests which the state must accommodate. If Giddens is poisonous on this, then presumably this model of collective identity politics is poisonous too?
More pertinently, though - my post did not argue that immigration per se was unsustainable, but that it was unsustainable at current levels. I was arguing this primarily on the basis not of culture, race, identity and the like, but of human population numbers. As I pointed out, current trends continuing would see a UK population increase of 17 million people in the next forty years.
You seem to be arguing - though you curiously don't spell it out - for an open borders policy (I agree with you, by the way, that tackling poverty elsewhere would doubtless reduce immigration to Europe, but it's hardly an either/or situation, or a quick fix). If this is so, how do you answer the question I posed in my post:
These are key questions which you need to be able to answer. Key also is who has the right to answer them. You snidely characterise my argument as 'one basis for the politics of resentment that argues that 'natives' - whether old or new - should have rights that migrants don't.' There's no resentment involved, but it should be blindingly obvious that British citizens have rights within Britain which those outside Britain don't have. They elect the British government which (allegedly) represents them and fund the British State which (allegedly) protects them. That's the basis of both national democracy and the welfare state, neither of which could exist under an 'open borders' model.
The citizens of every nation on Earth have a prior claim to their own government's attention, and rightly so. They vote for them and pay their salaries. Again, if you disagree - what's the alternative? It surely can't simply be to accuse everyone who disagrees with you of an ill-defined 'resentment'.
This post basically boils down to:
a) The entire world should be able to come here.
b) Once here they should have exactly the same rights as a citizen.
Presumably the rest of the waffle is to hide that basic message so people don't just treat it as the twaddle it is.
Paul. Thanks for the comments.
In Barking and Dagenham the BNP hold 13 council seats. However, this is sharply divided between the 12 in Dagenham and 1 in Barking. Whilst positing the idea that we are ‘naturally’ drawn to our own (not so distant from Giddens’ position), they also argue there is a shortage of housing that should be given to ‘natives’ before migrants. However, the BNP opposes The Thames Gateway Development and other moves to develop and provide new housing that exist largely in Barking – where they hold ‘only’ 1 seat – perhaps because greater social provision reduces the anxieties they seek to provoke?. Moral: greater social provision has a role in reducing social anxiety – there is nothing ‘natural’ about either our friendships and ties or the threat that supposedly arises to them from migrants coming in.
Paul, you are right. The left needs to state arguments for how we provide social resources for a growing population. The benefits of migration exist on a national level, whilst the costs are local. Michael Keith argues that, ‘Migrants are cheap for the welfare state. The majority come born, nurtured, schooled and skilled. They participate disproportionately in the workforce and are net contributors to tax revenues. But the social costs of migration in housing shortages and ethnic competition are focused on dense city neighbourhoods.’(www.socresonline.org.uk/13/5/11.html). We may begin to address this by redistributing that which accrues nationally, or to the City’s financial centres towards further development – and not necessarily in only our urban spaces. In this way we would be able to house more.
However, London is not Lagos. Whilst pockets exist, we’re not really that overcrowded are we? The boat isn’t really full, is it? The idea that some people have a prior claim on government resources because of the accident of where they happen to have been born is ultimately unethical. It is often premised on the conception that naturally formed and distinct communities compete with each other invoking claims on territory. Such competition does in places exist (although research shows how many communities work with and through cultural differences). Nonetheless, there is nothing ‘natural’ about it and I oppose the forms of multiculturalism (or ethnic particularism) that have this proposition as a basis. It is more divide and rule than ‘natural’ and the multicultural aristocracy that pushes this are implicated in it.
Instead, the perception of ‘natural’ differences is dominant despite other versions of multiculturalism premised on conviviality denying ‘natural’ or ‘incommensurable’ differences that work, often effectively, at a local level. Ultimately, Gidden’s idea is poisonous because it results in a system where an accident of birth determines, food, health, wealth etc etc. It implies, unless we oppose it, that the worth of humans differs depending on their birth. What could be more inhuman?
Paul. Thanks for the comments.
In Barking and Dagenham the BNP hold 13 council seats. However, this is sharply divided between the 12 in Dagenham and 1 in Barking. Whilst positing the idea that we are ‘naturally’ drawn to our own (not so distant from Giddens’ position), they also argue there is a shortage of housing that should be given to ‘natives’ before migrants. However, the BNP opposes The Thames Gateway Development and other moves to develop and provide new housing that exist largely in Barking – where they hold ‘only’ 1 seat – perhaps because greater social provision reduces the anxieties they seek to provoke?. Moral: greater social provision has a role in reducing social anxiety – there is nothing ‘natural’ about either our friendships and ties or the threat that supposedly arises to them from migrants coming in.
Paul, you are right. The left needs to state arguments for how we provide social resources for a growing population. The benefits of migration exist on a national level, whilst the costs are local. Michael Keith argues that, ‘Migrants are cheap for the welfare state. The majority come born, nurtured, schooled and skilled. They participate disproportionately in the workforce and are net contributors to tax revenues. But the social costs of migration in housing shortages and ethnic competition are focused on dense city neighbourhoods.’(www.socresonline.org.uk/13/5/11.html). We may begin to address this by redistributing that which accrues nationally, or to the City’s financial centres towards further development – and not necessarily in only our urban spaces. In this way we would be able to house more.
However, London is not Lagos. Whilst pockets exist, we’re not really that overcrowded are we? The boat isn’t really full, is it? The idea that some people have a prior claim on government resources because of the accident of where they happen to have been born is ultimately unethical. It is often premised on the conception that naturally formed and distinct communities compete with each other invoking claims on territory. Such competition does in places exist (although research shows how many communities work with and through cultural differences). Nonetheless, there is nothing ‘natural’ about it and I oppose the forms of multiculturalism (or ethnic particularism) that have this proposition as a basis. It is more divide and rule than ‘natural’ and the multicultural aristocracy that pushes this are implicated in it.
Instead, the perception of ‘natural’ differences is dominant despite other versions of multiculturalism premised on conviviality denying ‘natural’ or ‘incommensurable’ differences that work, often effectively, at a local level. Ultimately, Gidden’s idea is poisonous because it results in a system where an accident of birth determines, food, health, wealth etc etc. It implies, unless we oppose it, that the worth of humans differs depending on their birth. What could be more inhuman?
Shamser - thanks for coming back.
I think this argument is getting a little theoretical for my liking. It seems to be skipping around what I consider to be some obvious truths.
Obvious truth one: people do have kinship groups/cultures, and they feel connected to them. This is why immigrants, in Britain and elsewhere, tend at least at first to live in the same areas. They feel at home. They feel culturally comfortable. It also explains the oft-denied but clearly visible phenomenon of so-called 'white flight.' It is a truth observable everywhere on Earth and everywhere in history that people will tend to want to be with people 'like them': people of a similar class, social background, educational status, language, history and culture.
There's nothing wrong with this, in my view. People want to feel comfortable and they feel most comfortable in a place and with people they understand. Whether this is 'natural' or 'unnatural' is pretty irrelevant: it's an obvious truth. It also enriched us: cultural diversity is one of the great things about humanity. It is endlessly informative and fascinating, and is a marker of human complexity, history and responsiveness to place and nature.
None of this means that cultures cannot change and merge, and that people cannot integrate into other cultures: they do, all the time, and always have done. Nothing stays the same. But we need to be both gracious and realistic enough to accept this human reality. Cultural universalism of the kind you advocate is a grim prospect indeed. I am all in favour of universal human rights and universal opportunity, but not of some kind of cultural levelling. If you are seriously going to talk as if there were no such thing as cultural difference, you should not feel surprised when people feel threatened by your proposals.
Obvious truth two: people who are obliged by law to fund a state and obey the rules it lays down have prior claim on that state's attention. It's not unreasonable to expect the government to house and provide jobs for its taxpayers and voters before non-taxpayers and non-voters. This may not seem universally and theoretically 'fair', but in a world in which nation states are the dominant political players, it is an unavoidable reality. If this reality ceased to exist, the welfare state which makes this country a good place to live, especially for the poor, would cease to exist too, and the result would be grim for natives and migrants alike.
Obvious truth three: nation-states are not theoretical entities; they are places, to which people feel an attachment. English people who have grown up in England, for example, are likely to feel an attachment to it as their home. I certainly do. They may feel a sense of pride and patriotism. This, globally, is an extremely common emotion, from the USA to Indonesia to Iceland. Places are not blank slates onto which entire peoples can be shifted willy nilly in order to create some sort of economic global levelling effect. They have a history and a weight of human emotion attached to them. If you don't understand this, the 'resentment politics' you worry about will follow your ideas as night follows day.
Obvious truth three: your focus in this argument, which is almost entirely and dryly economic, feeds perfectly in to the placeless globalised capitalist model you claim to oppose - as I explained in my post on OK a week or so back.
You appear to believe that there are no limits to population growth in the UK. I believe this country is already overpopulated. It is certainly overcrowded, at least in the south of England (England is currently the most densely populated country in Europe). I am not prepared to accept that vast areas of countryside must be concreted over in order to accommodate massive population growth - and this would be my position whether that growth was a result of immigration or indigenous birth rates. As an environmentalist, I am aware of the existence of limits.
Like you, I would like to see global justice. I have spent a fair bit of my time writing about it and campaigning for it. But 'justice' is not best served by the kind of 'open door' politics you are so keen on. Justice, in my view, is best served by a fair global economic system, which corporations and powerful governments do not skew in their favour. It is best served by accountable governments in poorer countries, which may or may not be formulated along Western lines. It is best served by appropriate technology transfer (from north to south and vice versa). It is best served by land reform and by the creation of new global institutions to replace the Bretton Woods model which has served us so badly. I could go on.
It is not best served by promoting unsustainable mass population transfer which will benefit neither native nor migrant populations (who won't get much out of arriving in an overcrowded, underfunded country with tatty infrastructure and an angry population - especially if it's in recession.) This is not the language of justice - it's the language of the market, and it's a language that ignores human reality in favour of theoretical abstraction.
Shamser
I liked your article, I don't tend to like many articles on immigration - they usually are sensationalist and badly aruged, more for political scoring than anything else. The sort of articles you know you should swtich off from - coz people usually have their positions defined, prior to doing any listening.
You raise an interesting point. The net weight of immigration is actually borne by poorer parts of the world, with less border control and means to aborb them - and these countries complain less.
My sense is that it's not actual numbers of immigrants in the UK , though for some liberal minded folks across the colour divide it is, but for many that are exercised by immigration, it is the colour in these numbers. It is colour and numbers combined. For thought folks who jump and say, it's not colour, look at Polish immigration, we object to that, too. Sorry, it is. It was like that with Irish immigration, too. The Irish were white but not white, if you get my drift.
The unsaid and unspoken issue is the prejudice we find among people when they see large numbers that look different or stand out - or indeed, sometimes the numbers don't have to be large - they can just be one. You only have to be one black person to stand out in a homegemous white crowd and it invites attention.
And your point about the politics of white resentment is spot on, too. It ain't about wanting to understand or share concerns about white disadvantage - let's face it, many years ago, we just used to talk about working class disadvantage, mostly to refer to groups we now call the 'white underclass'. What's changed? Language has. Language is never neutral turf when arguing about emotional issues such as immigration - it is, instead, the means with which to further flare up the topic. These days, it would seem, we use language such as white disadvantage, not to empower the white working class, but in fact to question the legitimacy of black and asian folks in white -majority world to be successful. This is the subtext. God forbid, if a minority is successful in business, it surely must be at the expense of the dominant population. With Obama now at the helm of the US, it will now be argued that discrimination and glass ceiling etc have disappeared - and who ever wants to succeed on merit can. (Sub-text here is that somehow minorities don't compete on merit when they talk about disadvantage.) Except we didn't see the glass ceiling disappear with Thatcher's election, we understood gender discrimination was a structural issue, so we never expected much from Thatcher in terms of women's equality. But we expect many things from Obama's success.
I have regressed - the point I was making is that I agree with your central point - resentment is based on envy that minority groups might be doing well, not because surely white populations are marginalised in white-majority countries. If this was the case we would talk about good old fashioned things like redistribution of wealth , social justice and so on. Instead , the very people that want to undermine social justice for all disadvantaged groups will happlu play the race card - on grounds that they are battling the BNP, when in reality they are battling with sacred British principles like the welfare state and the desire to help the vulnerable in society. Nice smoke-screen.
Hi Shamser,
Can you say something about how the introduction of ID cards fits in with the situation you highlight?
On a train down to Cornwall I was sat in front of a squaddie. He was just back from Iraq and told his new friend how he was probably quite racist. This was because he thought that to stop terrorism we should get everyone who is not white to come to the police station and investigate; what they're doing here and why etc, etc ,etc.
The ID card system is based on the idea that random (rather than specific intelligence-led) checks could catch illegal migrants and terrorists. We know this is ineffective because of the failures of random police stop and search, sanctioned by the Prevention of Terrorism Act, in apprehending and then prosecuting people for terrorist offences. Look at the figures. It doesn't work. Only a very, very, small minority of those arrested under the Act are prosecuted for such offences - and that is through intelligence-led operations rather than random stop and search.
The conclusion is that ID cards and random stop and search are about placating the squaddie on the train who wanted all non-whites checked at police stations. The ID cards are therefore a continuation of a politics that wishes to turn neighbour against neighbour and divide multicultural Britain, as I highlight in my piece.
I have to disagree with Paul's "obvious truths". Truth number one, is that people like to be around people who are similar - whether a similar class, culture or interest.
I don't deny that it is true on a level. However, should it be encouraged? One great advantage of an open society is that you hear different ideas and different perspectives and can challenge your ways of thinking. That is healthy, and good for both society and the individual.
The same is true of a diverse society, where we can experience on a personal level different cultures, different interests, different lifestyles and different classes. I want to live in a diverse society and want government to resist the temptation to encourage segregation - on whatever grounds. I don't accept that segregation is "natural" nor do I agree that it is widespread in Britain today; indeed many Afro-Caribbeans and Asians today are quite comfortabe living well outside their original "settlements" in Brixton or Southall.
Second, you call the nation state an "obvious truth", binding its citizens to the exclusion of all others. Actually it is no more than a fairly recent innovation and an ideology we can either support or challenge. Indeed, the concept of regional or global citizenship has developed in leaps and bounds recently - from the European ideal of freedom of movement to the UN's "responsibility to protect. In a world of unprecedented global capital flows, transnational corporations, global environmental problems and, of course, global migration, nation states are increasing unable to provide answers. The solutions are necessarily global, and the logics of a global citizenship are more appropriate a response that outdated nation state models.
The same is true of a diverse society, where we can experience on a personal level different cultures, different interests, different lifestyles and different classes.
How do you experience it? I always hear people on the left use this line when it comes to mass immigration, about how much they learn from diversity and how important an experience it is, and the amazing vibrancy of inner London blah blah, without ever mentioning specifics. The same mushy reasoning over and over again, with no meat.
What have you learned?
"I want to live in a diverse society and want government to resist the temptation to encourage segregation"
Why do you want to live in a diverse society? Personally I want to live in a good society where diversity is possible (formerly individualism or liberalism) but not pandered to, a society where I feel I belong, where I feel secure. The problem of people who encourage diversity is that they encourage segregation. Like religious state schools for example (thanks Tony).
I have absolutely no hesitation in telling you that if I had kids and lived in Bradford I would not send my kids to a school with a majority Muslim intake. Nor would I send them to a Catholic school, nor to an inner city London school with a third world intake. And I feel no shame or embarrassment about saying that.
You may feel differently, in which case I respect your right to live by those beliefs, but in respecting "diversity" you must respect my right to be different from you, and to live apart from you and people like you, to self-segregate. The words diversity and different and divide have the same root.
It's trendy to say that nation states are a modern invention, but it's not strictly true. Modern nation states - state nations - with their passports and border controls, citizenship and omnipotent governments are a fairly modern invention. But not nation states - if by "nation state" you mean "nation" having boundaries that are coterminous with the "state".
Halima and Shamsa -
Speaking as a 'white', can I just say that being referred to as a 'white' really gets my back up. I'm not 'white', I'm English. I don't go around referring to people as 'blacks' or 'browns', for obvious reasons.
I've never met anyone from Britain who self-identifies as 'white'; I have met many with English, Scottish, Welsh and Cornish identities though. The only self-declared 'whites' I've encountered have been open racists or ethnic nationalists, and fortunately there aren't that many of them around. Best not to encourage them, eh?
Halima - what you're actually grasping for is the concept of culture, not colour. That's why the tabloids find it just as easy - actually, easier these days - to foam at the mouth about Poles as they do about people from South Asia. People all over the world do indeed react when people from very different cultural backgrounds arrive in their midst. Colour certainly exacerbates that problem, but it's not the root cause.
More importantly, since all of us are apparently interested in living as one in this country, can I suggest we drop the 'whites' stuff forthwith please.
Andrew - people do tend to culturally self-segregate, and we can certainly see that in parts of the UK. And no, it should not be encouraged; it should be discouraged, on all sides. This means creating a country in which we all see ourselves as part of the same national culture, not as 'ethnic groups' with distinct cultures within the same state boundary - the outcome which state multiculturalism promotes, even if unwittingly.
As Toque says, 'nation states' in the modern sense are pretty much a 19th century development, but the concept of the nation is very much older. The English, for example, clearly saw themselves as a nation within specific boundaries as far back as the tenth century. As I pointed out in my reply, of course, none of this stuff is immutable - all identities change over time as they absorb new people and influences. But they still exist, and people still feel attached to them. My worry about Shamser's approach is that he doesn't acknowledge this.
My view is that in a very multi-ethnic country, we need to be encouraging people to mix and match and consider themselves part of the same 'gang', not members or rival teams based on ethnicity. Personally I'd like to see a lot more mixed marriage, a lot more mixed schooling and policies which encourage people to overcome their mutual suspicion and celebrate their shared British (or English, Cornish, Welsh etc if you prefer) identities together, instead of policies and approaches which entrench difference and reinforce the kind of 'resentment' - in all communities, white or otherwise - which Shamser rightly abhors.
Paul, I take it that you don't like being called white, then, and that you don't feel white? That you really feel English and that's what's important to you? Yet, as you've stated before in your debate with Vron Ware, you feel that ethnicity/race is no barrier to Englishness, so that yer Bilal from Bradford and Kwame from Kennington are 'just as English' as you, no? So, if this is a multi-ethnic country (as you've said in this post), and you aren't white (or at least you don't like to admit it!), yet the English are not an ethnic group, what ethnic group do you belong to? Who are you?
Cynic,
There's more than one type of "English". There are people whose ethnic identity is English, and people whose national identity is English, and people like me, who is both ethnically English and feels a strong English national identity.
There are people like my wife who is ethnically English, but whose national identity is Canadian. Then there are "Bilal from Bradford and Kwame from Kennington" who may not be ethnically English, but nevertheless feel English, and are recognised by me as English. Then there are Anglo-Brits, people who are English, quite clearly English, who call themselves British - even though they wouldn't last two seconds in a Glasgow pub.
The English are an ethnic group. The English are also more than an ethnic group, and more diverse than an ethnic group. England was never about race, it was about face, and whether it fit - our way or the highway, whoever you are.
I get people like you (and I don't think I'm being unfair) all the time arguing with me about civic English nationalism. You think it's a threat to your Englishness because every Tom, Dick and Abdul starts calling himself English, which devalues it for you. It's so pathetic I feel like beating my head against a wall. Are you that insecure in your culture? Do you really think that your ethnicity is threatened by a strong inclusive English national identity? Or can you just not distinguish ethnic identity, from national identity, from state identity (citizenship)?
Well, my 'English identity' isn't threatened, since I'm not English! I do find this 'progressive English nationalism' strange, and I'm trying to get a grip on it. If you aren't going for blood-and-soil ethnic nationalism and you want an all-inclusive happy-smiley identity, then why not stick with 'Britishness'? That's even more inclusive! Is it all a preparation for if/when the Scots become independent and England is alone?
England was never about race, it was about face, and whether it fit - our way or the highway, whoever you are.
So, are you saying that Englishness was always unconnected with race? Really? If so, why the need for a 'progressive re-appropriation of Englishness'?
Cynic -
There's not much to add to what Toque has put very well indeed, but:
My point was not that I'm not 'white' - I am. My point was that I don't identify as white. I don't give a toss what colour I am, and I don't accept race as a viable marker of identity. It doesn't interest me in the slightest. I can think of no situation anywhere in the world, at any time in history, where an identification with 'race' has done anything but hinder progress and cause strife between people of different origins.
You ask me who I am. My answer is that I am English. There is such a thing as an English ethnicity, and I regard myself as part of the English ethnic group. The point about ethnic groups, though, is that they are mutable. They change over time and can absorb new people; they are largely self-defining. The English ethnic group has managed to absorb others for a thousand years. It has absorbed Jews and Americans and it has even absorbed the Normans who conquered the country and unleashed mass slaughter on the English people; their descendants are now English too, and neither you or I could tell the difference between an English person of Norman or Saxon descent if we passed them in the street.
So, on the subject of Bilal and Kwame - they don't become English by the simple act of just turning up in England. But when and if they - or, more likely, their children, born here - consider their primary identity to be English; consider this their country; consider themselves to be part of it, as I do - then yes, they are English too. As English as I am, if not the same colour. Why wouldn't they be? What would be stopping them?
I get very frustrated with this constant 'Englishness is under threat' narrative. English culture changes all the time, and if it is under threat from anything at the moment it is American-style consumerism, which is wiping out our cultural particularities far faster than Kwame and Bilal ever could, assuming they even wanted to. English identity will continue to change, as it always has, and it will never be based on race or the idea of a single, unchangeable 'ethnicity' which is gifted by descent from Ulfric the Saxon. Instead it will be based, as it always has been, on England the place, and the lives lived by the people who inhabit it.
OK, so I was being unfair!
Britishness isn't inclusive, hence devolution to Scotland and Wales, an act that has devalued Britain for most English people who previously - happily and without much thought - blurred the distinction between nation and state, a conflation of England and Britain. Some say that the rise of England has a cultural basis dating back to the mid-nineties, but for me the politicisation of English identity is a direct consequence of devolution and the fragmentation of Britain.
English identity has been about race in the past, and occasionally movements spring up to reinforce that. However, "Englishness", which is not the same as ethnic identity, is not about race. Because the English have invested a lot of their national identity in institutions - many of which have turned out to be British - it allowed non-English people (particularly during the second Empire) to become part of the English endeavor. The Scots and Welsh have requested to play a reduced role in that English endeavor, and in the institutions of greater England. The English are adjusting accordingly, contracting from greater England to little England.
Although English identity can be about race, ethncity, institutions of state, culture, it is also about the national identity of the country of England (nation = people, country= territory). Ethnic nationalism opperates across boundaries, across territories; civic nationalism within them (we are little Englanders). I try not to use the word "progressive" because my idea of progression is so often opposed to that of the progressives.
If you are not English, then what is your interest?
There has been much use of the term 'citizenship' in this debate. I know it's not the answer to everything but having a clear definition of citizenship with a written constitution seems like a good idea. Whether for a Cornish, English, Scottish, Welsh or British state a written constitution for all citizens to fall back on that provides a guarantee of equality before the law has to be the first step. Dam it give me a republic.
The Cornish Democrat
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