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Abstract
This article examines the complex interactions between British national identity and the territorial identities of Northern Ireland and Scotland. We argue that the current literature on national identities in Britain misunderstands the nature of British identities in Northern Ireland and Scotland. Indeed, much of this literature wrongly defines Unionists in both of these areas. By examining the content of British national identity, a comparison of Scotland and Northern Ireland reveals that Unionism finds political significance through an ideological project committed to the Union. However, we also have to account for the differences in the Unionist ideology of Scotland and Northern Ireland. We argue that the institutional framework in which these identities and ideologies are exercised explains this variation. Overall, we argue that the debate on nationalism in the United Kingdom has not adequately shown how the integrative functions of British national identity can co-exist with the separatist nature of territorial national identity.
Acknowledgements
Christopher Farrington would like to thank the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences for research funding. Graham Walker acknowledges assistance from the Leverhulme Trust.
Notes
1. CitationMcCrone, ‘Who Do You Say You Are?’; see also CitationMitchell, ‘The Evolution of Devolution’.
2. CitationBrown, ‘Are there Good and Bad Nationalisms?’; CitationPeters, ‘A New Look at “National Identity”’; on Spain see CitationMuro and Quiroga, ‘Spanish Nationalism’; on the United Kinfdom see CitationLanglands, ‘Britishness or Englishness?’
3. McCrone, ‘Who Do You Say You Are?’
4. CitationKiely et al., ‘Birth, Blood and Belonging’; CitationDay et al., ‘Being English’; CitationMuldoon et al., ‘Religious and National Identity’; CitationTodd, ‘Social Transformation’.
5. CitationBillig, Banal Nationalism; CitationColley, Britons; CitationWeight, Patriots.
6. Although see CitationMacDonald, Unionist Scotland; CitationMcLean and McMillan, State of the Union; CitationWard, Unionism.
7. See the articles in the special issue of Citation Publius .
8. CitationKeating, Plurinational Democracy.
9. CitationGuibernau, Nations without States.
10. See CitationConnor, Ethnonationalism, 103; CitationKeating, The New Regionalism, 86; and CitationSmith, National Identity, 14 for respective definitions of each category.
11. Ward, Unionism.
12. McLean and McMillan, State of the Union, 135.
13. CitationMiller, Queen's Rebels; CitationWalker, Intimate Strangers.
14. CitationMcBride, ‘Ulster and the British Problem’; Walker, Intimate Strangers.
15. CitationGaniel, ‘Ulster Says Maybe’.
16. See CitationBryant, Nations of Britain, 64.
17. CitationFinlay, Modern Scotland.
18. CitationDevine, ‘History's Judgement’.
19. www.scottishexecutive.gov.uk/library/documents7.
20. CitationStuart, John Smith.
21. See CitationRosen, ‘John P. Mackintosh’. There are many pertinent documents regarding CitationMackintosh's thinking on devolution and the United Kingdom in his collected papers in the National Library of Scotland, Dep 323.
22. CitationWalker, Thomas Johnston; Ward, Unionism, 41–56.
23. CitationBrown, Moving Britain Forward; CitationBrown and Alexander, Stronger Together. See CitationCrick, ‘The Four Nations’ for a critique of Brown's Britishness campaign.
24. Charles Kennedy, ‘My Travels around a Fickle Nation’, The Herald, 16 January 2007.
25. CitationKellas, ‘After the Declaration’. It should also be noted that the Labour Party in Scotland dropped its commitment to Home Rule in 1958 and resumed it somewhat reluctantly in 1974.
26. CitationMarshall, The Billy Boys.
27. CitationMitchell, Conservatives and the Union.
28. CitationFarrington, Ulster Unionism, 14–84.
29. CitationAughey, Under Siege; CitationFoster, The Idea of the Union.
30. CitationSmout, ‘Introduction’.
31. CitationCurtice, ‘A Stronger or Weaker Union?’
32. CitationDavidson, ‘British Empire’; CitationDavidson, Origins; CitationFry, Scottish Empire.
33. Smout, ‘Introduction’.
34. For an example of this see Curtice, ‘A Stronger or Weaker Union?’, 95.
35. CitationMcGarry and O'Leary, Explaining Northern Ireland, 354.
36. CitationMcGarry and O'Leary, Explaining Northern Ireland, 354
37. CitationGallagher, ‘How Many Nations?’.
38. CitationCochrane, Unionist Politics; CitationShirlow and McGovern, Who are the People?; CitationTodd, ‘Two Traditions’.
39. Todd, ‘Social Transformation’.
40. Cochrane, Unionist Politics; Todd, ‘Two Traditions’.
41. CitationGuelke, Northern Ireland, 4.
42. There are other instances of these composite images, such as the Royal Coat of Arms. However, the emblem embossed on passports has only been introduced lately.
43. Cochrane, Unionist Politics, 372.
44. Farrington, Ulster Unionism; CitationFarrington, ‘Unionism and the Peace Process’.
45. Farrington, Ulster Unionism; CitationAughey, ‘Learning from the Leopard’.
46. CitationHMSO, Joint Declaration. This is restated by the British and Irish governments in CitationHMSO, Agreement Reached in the Multi-party Negotiations.
47. CitationOfficer and Walker, ‘Protestant Ulster’.
48. Keating, Plurinational Democracy.
49. CitationMitchell, ‘Evolution and Devolution’.
50. CitationAnderson, ‘Exploring the Paradox’; CitationBerneo, ‘The Import of Institutions’; CitationNolte, ‘Federalism’; CitationO'Leary, ‘Federations’.
51. Aughey, Under Siege; Farrington, Ulster Unionism, 61–82.
52. CitationTomlinson, ‘Reconstructing Britain’.
53. Mitchell, Conservatives and the Union, 8–14.
54. Walker, Intimate Strangers.
55. Finlay, Modern Scotland, 330.
56. CitationMcEwen, ‘State Welfare Nationalism’.
57. CitationFinlay, A Partnership for Good?, 14–35.
58. CitationLevy and Geekie, ‘Devolution’.
59. McEwen, ‘State Welfare Nationalism’, 79.
60. CitationWalker, A History of the Ulster Unionist Party, 104–10.
61. CitationMcGarry and O'Leary, The Politics of Antagonism, 157–8.
62. CitationDewar, ‘Devolution’. Dewar echoed the positive views on Northern Ireland's devolved government experiment held by John Mackintosh – see, for example, NLS, Dep 323/145.
63. See views of Garret FitzGerald in the Irish Times, 12 April 2006.
64. See the Northern Ireland Life and Times Survey's questions on constitutional preference, http://www.ark.ac.uk/nilt/results/polatt.html#conpref (accessed 14 July 2006).
65. Ward, Unionism, 183.
66. CitationJackson, The Ulster Party.
67. CitationCoulter, ‘The Origins’.
68. CitationGay and Mitchell, ‘Stormont’.
69. CitationMcCrone, ‘Unmasking Britannia’; Mitchell, ‘The Evolution of Devolution’. Mitchell, ‘Evolution and Devolution’.
70. Mitchell, ‘Evolution and Devolution’.
71. McLean and McMillan, State of the Union, 8–9.
72. CitationKellas, The Scottish Political System.
73. CitationThatcher, The Downing Street Years, 619.
74. CitationPaterson, The Autonomy of Modern Scotland.
75. CitationCrick, ‘The Sovereignty of Parliament’.
76. CitationCoulter, ‘Direct Rule’.
77. Billig, Banal Nationalism.
78. Coulter, ‘Direct Rule’.
79. For a discussion of the restructuring arising from the Belfast Agreement see CitationRuane and Todd, ‘The Politics of Transition?’
80. Farrington, Ulster Unionism.
81. CitationDavies, The Isles; CitationNairn, After Britain; Weight, Patriots.
82. McLean and McMillan, State of the Union, 239–56.
83. CitationMcLean, ‘Scotland’.
84. Curtice, ‘A Stronger or Weaker Union?’
85. David Marquand, ‘He Will Always be Defined by the Conflict he Started not the Conflict he Ended’, The Guardian, 11 May 2007.
86. CitationHechter, Containing Nationalism.
87. McEwen, ‘State Welfare Nationalism’; CitationGreer, Territorial Politics.
88. See CitationConstitution Unit, Devolution and the Centre, 39.
89. See Party Officer Johnny Andrews’ article in the Belfast Telegraph, 19 December 2007.
90. See former party leader David Trimble's comments in the Irish Times, 8 December 2007.
91. CitationHopkin and Bradbury, ‘British Statewide Parties’.
92. Bryant, Nations, 58, says Scotland is ‘where the future of the Union will be decided’; see also 296.
93. Tom Devine, ‘The Union is Safe in the Embrace of the Scottish Raj’, The Guardian, 5 December 2006.
94. Irish Times editorial, 20 June 2007; The Herald (Glasgow) editorial, 19 June 2007.
95. The Herald, 23 June 2007.