In the new age, a new sense of Britishness

Published on Wednesday 26 September 2001 01:00

THE most recent edition of the journal Soundings has in it a series of articles under the heading "A Very British Affair". Written during the summer, several pieces wonder whether the idea of Britain as one entity is now obsolete.

The research I conducted for my own contribution led me to conclude that "the whole concept of Britishness smacks of obsolescence". Jim McCormick, of the Scottish Policy Foundation, and writer Gerry Hassan dissect Tom Nairn’s belief that the dissolution of the United Kingdom is inevitable because of, among other things, "the anachronism and decline of Great Britain".

However, in a statement of great prescience, McCormick and Hassan urge caution on anybody who thinks that they can see into the future. They remind us of the "unpredictability that can bring itself to bear on the fate of nations".

The events of the last fortnight have shown the wisdom of McCormick and Hassan’s advice. So many things have altered since 11 September, not least that postcards, films and casually taken personal photographs which have the twin towers in the background have become poignant historical records. The Pentagon is no longer a pentagon. Steel cutlery on aircraft has been replaced by plastic knives and forks.

But these are superficial changes. Deeper changes are also afoot. Before 11 September, the declared enemy of democracy was not a callous bunch of extreme Muslim fundamentalists but apathy. Remember our recent general election at which more than 40 per cent of us did not bother to vote? Had that election taken place on 12 September, the turnout would have vastly increased. The same would have been the case in the American presidential elections. Apathy dissolves when a real threat materialises and threats don’t get much more real than the proven ability of a few dedicated men to kill more than 6,000 people in cities at the heart of the last great superpower. The politics of disengagement are over, at any rate for the time being.

Ground Zero has vanquished apathy. I would also argue that notwithstanding the 74 per cent of Scots who feel, God help us, that the Scottish executive should add its penn’orth’s worth to the debate over appropriate retaliatory action, Ground Zero has also offered the concept of Britishness a reprieve.

From the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 until 11 September, 2001, the concept of Britishness has been unravelling. With the Empire gone, the Cold War over and respect for the monarchy at an all-time low, there was little to hold the Union together. The Scottish parliament, the Welsh assembly and the prospect of English regional devolution have meant that the Union flag has, in many places, been usurped by the St George’s Cross, the Saltire or the Dragon. What is Britishness these days? ask commentators. What was it ever? ask historians such as Linda Colley.

A few months ago, Charles Kennedy provided an answer. He described Britishness as the "willingness to get a job done together". He was right. But until 11 September, we were confused about the nature of the job that needed doing. Now, as Britain stands shoulder to shoulder with America, we know. The words of McCormick and Hassan put it perfectly clearly. "The narratives that have explained the UK," they remind us, "have been about defining ourselves in relation to hostile foreigners or an alien ideology." Since 11 September, this definition has acquired a new momentum. Unlike battles for faraway islands or over unfamiliar Balkan territory, a campaign against terrorists means that the people of Britain have a common purpose again.

The first casualty has been the Scottish National Party. Under the canard of "respect for the dead", the SNP leader, John Swinney, cancelled a debate on defence policy at his party conference just when defence policy is uppermost in people’s minds. I suppose it was respectful in a way. SNP defence policy is the stuff of primary-school classes, not at all suitable for public airing in a world in which grown-up thinking is required. There is something rather sweet about a party that thinks a few placards declaring Scotland a "nuclear-free zone" will ensure the safety of our children. Sweet and perfectly silly. The SNP joined with the suicide pilots in boosting the cause of Unionism.

For the threat to these islands as a result of our post-atrocity pact with the United States means that Scotland will play its part in the struggles to come in a decidedly British context. Scots soldiers will go into action as part of the British Army. The word "British" will resound nightly from our television screens. Opt-outs such as Scottish Newsnight will be overtaken by British events. If Jeremy Paxman is interviewing Dick Cheney or Colin Powell about skirmishes in the Afghan mountains, no Scot will be interested in Gordon Brewer interviewing Rhona Brankin about air particulates in Edinburgh. Proceedings at Holyrood will become even more of an irrelevant farce. Westminster will come back into its own.

In New Scotland, New Britain, published by Douglas Alexander and Gordon Brown in 1999 as a weapon in the war against separatism, shared values and institutions were supposed to provide a new type of glue to keep the United Kingdom together. The cohesive qualities of religion and warfare, they argued, had been overtaken by the welfare state, the NHS and the BBC.

The pamphlet showed very clearly how 50 years of peace at home have redefined our priorities. Alexander and Brown could argue this way because national security was a given. Without national security, the institutions of civil society are irrelevant.

In a Britain under threat, older threads pull us together. We see these ancient threads operating already in a United States never more united than now. Americans now talk about "our president" as if the fiasco over the dimpled chads had never happened. Further atrocities will reinforce this unity. It remains to be seen whether body-bags can break it. It is just the same in post-11 September Britain.

Reverberations from the events of that terrible Tuesday will echo for years to come. The physical debris may not be cleared up for 18 months to two years and the emotional scars of the bereaved will take much longer to heal. But quite apart from the personal tragedies and the devastation to the infrastructure of two major American cities, the political fallout all over the world will be immense.

In purely domestic terms, as Blair, the consummate politician, knows all too well, the collapse of the twin towers, the smashing of the Pentagon and the field of bodies in Pennsylvania will have an effect on the next British general election, particularly if our European partners find that their shoulders and those of President Bush are not quite as together as the president might like. The UK may find its own shoulders need to be very broad indeed.

If that does happen, the concept of Britishness, far from being obsolete, may well reinvent itself. If you have a Union flag, don’t throw it away just yet. It’s an ill wind, as they say.