Description
Despite being one of IR’s foundational concerns, scholars of International Relations have paid little attention to secessionist nationalism since the collapse of communism in Europe. Notwithstanding this relative neglect, nationalism in its different varieties continues to play a significant part in global politics, not least through the relationship between nationalism, European disintegration and Brexit. This paper places the relationship between Brexit and English nationalism in the conceptual and typological contexts of nationalism theory. By examining the politics of sub-state nationalist mobilisations across the UK in the decade that straddled the Brexit referendum of 2016, this paper takes a novel approach by considering Brexit as an important shift in the political goals of English nationalism. When put in such perspectives, Brexit represents a historic shift in the goal of English nationalism. It did so by moving English nationalism from an integrative mode (integrating its main historic political structures of UK state, British Empire and EU) to a secessionist mode (seeking independence from the EU). Importantly the British state remained the vehicle for this shift at the elite level, and discursive constructions of English nationalism remained highly merged with the legitimisation of British sovereignty at this critical juncture.
