Britishness not the key to social cohesion

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Tom Griffin, 21 - 07 - 2008

Tom Griffin (London, The Green Ribbon): The Government's approach to social cohesion has been challenged today in a new report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

Immigration and Social Cohesion in the UK, by Mary Hickman, Helen Crowley and Nick Mai of London Metropolitan University, questions 'the idea that we need a fixed notion of Britishness and British values'

In debates about social cohesion policies, we conclude that there needs to be a shift away from:

• the link frequently made between social cohesion and terrorism to one that links social cohesion and social transformations;

• the assumption that transnational ties weaken a sense of belonging to Britain – we found no evidence of this at all – to one that recognises that it’s possible to have diasporic ties without this being at the expense of belonging to Britain;

• a set account of what Britishness entails to, the provision of safe, secure and convenient neighbourhoods and good public services for everyone.

We found that it is new immigrants and the long-term settled, minority ethnic population who express strong attachments to Britain in terms of appreciation of the values of democracy, free speech and tolerance. The greatest criticisms of the Government came from the long-term settled, majority ethnic group. They were most critical of government handling of and the practices of the welfare state (largely because the welfare state fi gures prominently in accounts of what they appreciated about Britain) and the pursuance of war in Iraq. Nevertheless, for most of this group, Britain was a taken-for-granted home. A generation of young second and third-generation, long-term settled, minority ethnic people, mostly Asian, were also critical, mostly about cases of discrimination and injustice. This stems, not from their disengagement from Britain, but from their sense of belonging to Britain.

Tom Griffin's blog | email this blogpdf version | quote

britologywatch said:

Thu, 2008-07-24 07:41

The JRF report does indeed take issue with the government's view that social cohesion can be fostered by trying to impose a common set of British values on everyone and, in particular, on the English. However, it also regards a confident and resurgent English national identity as a threat to British multi-ethnic integration - but not, inconsistently, Scottish and Northern Irish national identity. It seeks to counter this threat by defining Englishness as an ethnic category, in the hope that 'ethnic English' people will then be able to re-engage with multi-ethnic Britain, seeing themselves as just one ethnic group among many. Readers might be interested in my <a href=http://britologywatch.wordpress.com/2008/07/24/joseph-rowntree-foundation-report-on-social-cohesion-promotes-ethnic-marginalisation-of-the-english/>extensive critique</a> of the JRF report.

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