Perceived Threats and Defensive Identities: A Psycho-Political investigation into Britishness in 2020

Dr Tabitha Baker (Bournemouth University, Lecturer in Politics, UK)

In 2020, three political, social, and cultural significant events occurred within months of each other: Britain’s official exit from the European Union, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the uprising of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd. These events, although dissimilar in nature, brought issues of British national identity to the forefront politically, behaviourally, and culturally, demonstrating its persistent, salient, and powerful force in contemporary political life. This paper introduces a psycho-political approach to understanding national identity, that draws on political psychological understandings of defensive identities and national narcissism, along with psychosocial perspectives of large-group identities, to explore the complex psychodynamics in the 2020 British political landscape. To accomplish this, 28 in-depth interviews were conducted with British citizens of voting age residing in rural South-West England from May 2020 to August 2020. The findings, analysed thematically, provide nuanced insights into how British identity was perceived to be under threat, resulting in defensive and grandiose expressions through avenues of post-colonial melancholia, national mythology, and war-time nostalgia. The paper thus recommends continued research to consider underlying psycho-political factors when examining how changes in political, economic, and social environments can unsettle identity attachments and exacerbate cultural conflict. It aims to investigate how these defensive and persecutory patterns, which are used to manage anxiety among voting citizens, may have may harmful implications for establishing a cohesive national identity during crises.

Le séminaire aura lieu dans la salle de réunion du CeSCuP ainsi qu’en ligne, via ce lien :

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