The disruptive rise of English nationalism

ENGLISH NATIONALISM is the most disruptive force in British politics. Brexit would have been impossible without it. The clash between Scottish and English nationalism may well break up the country. It’s also the most perplexing. The distinction between “English” and “British” has always been hazy, and now the very meaning of “Englishness” is changing before our eyes.

Its current transformation makes the nationalism on display in England perhaps the newest in the world, as well as the oldest. Historians argue that England already had a sense of national identity under the Anglo-Saxons, a millennium before the Germans and the Italians. Yet today’s English nationalism is a very different beast from the classic variety that George Orwell celebrated in “England, Your England” in 1941.