The Identity Cake

British identity is a cake long in the making.

One of the oddities of contemporary Britain is that everyone seems happy to acknowledge the existence of Welsh identity, Scottish identity or Irish identity, but many become noticeably uncomfortable once the same discussion turns to the English.

My own starting point is fairly straightforward. I think nations are real. I think culture is real. I think ancestry is real. I think historical continuity is real.

The question I always ask is not whether these things are politically convenient, but whether they are true.

I have predominantly Welsh ancestry, but also English ancestry. Much of my culture has been shaped by Wales and much by England so, if you like, it is ‘Anglo-Welsh’. Politically I’m ‘Welsh British’. I am entirely comfortable with being a member of a political state which is a relatively successful union of multiple ethnic and national identities, some ancient, some added more recently.

My layered identity is not unusual. Most people’s identities are complex. The reality is we belong to families, regions, nations and cultures simultaneously. The modern habit of demanding a single, pure and exclusive identity seems far less realistic than simply accepting that human beings often inhabit several identities at once.

This is where I become suspicious of some contemporary arguments around English identity.

I happen to think English identity including cultural and ethnic identity is a ‘thing’ and distinguishable from being British, which to me – as a Welshman – is more of a ‘civic’ identity.

And if Welsh identity can possess an ancestral element, why not English identity?

If historical continuity matters for the Scots, why not the English?

If ancestry is one component of Welsh identity, why is it somehow illegitimate when discussing English identity?

The answer cannot simply be that one discussion feels politically comfortable and the other does not.

I do not believe ancestry is everything. Equally, I do not believe ancestry is nothing.

It is one strand in a larger story. Culture matters. History matters. Shared institutions matter. Collective memory matters. Ancestry matters too.

The reality of English identity, however, does not tell us what political conclusions should follow. This is where the conversation often goes wrong.

People hear:

English identity is real.

And immediately translate it into:

Therefore English ethnic nationalism.

Or:

Therefore unequal citizenship.

Or:

Therefore repatriation.

But those conclusions do not follow automatically.

The existence of a thing does not determine its political significance.

Religion is real. Family is real. Class is real. Culture is real. None of that tells us how a modern state should distribute rights and obligations.

This is where I part company with many people on both Left and Right.

I have little patience for reparations politics. The idea that contemporary citizens owe vast sums because of events that took place centuries ago strikes me as philosophically incoherent. But I am equally sceptical of schemes to repatriate the descendants of immigrants who settled here decades ago.

The two positions appear opposed, but they rest on the same underlying assumption.

The politics of reparations and the politics of repatriations are mirror images of one another. Both assume that ancestry can generate contemporary political claims. Both seek to use politics to rectify historical grievances. Both ultimately founder on the same reality: time has passed.

Time matters.

The grandson of a slave is not a slave.

The grandson of a slave-owner is not a slave-owner.

Equally, the grandson of an immigrant is not an immigrant.

Time creates new realities. People marry. Families form. Communities emerge. Citizens are born. New loyalties are established. History becomes inheritance rather than immediate experience.

This is why I become uncomfortable whenever political claims are advanced primarily on the basis of ancestry.

The problem comes when we say:

X should benefit.

Or:

X should suffer.

Not because of anything X has done, but because X belongs to some historical category.

At that point we have quietly abandoned personal responsibility and replaced it with collective attribution.

The descendants of labouring English families undoubtedly contributed a great deal to the country we inherited. The descendants of Welsh miners contributed. Scottish engineers contributed. Irish labourers contributed. Later migrants contributed. Countless individuals added their own ingredients over centuries.

Modern Britain, or the YOO-KAY if you prefer, is the cake that emerged from that process.

Some ingredients were bigger than others. Some were admirable. Some were not. Some arrived later than others. But once the cake has been baked, it cannot be unbaked.

History is baked in.

The same principle applies whether someone wishes to remove slavery from British history, remove empire from British history, or remove the descendants of post-war immigrants from British history.

Politics cannot perform historical surgery.

It must deal with the society that actually exists.

This, ultimately, is why I keep returning to citizenship.

Not because I believe citizenship creates nations. Nations require culture, memory, continuity and inheritance. They are far more than passport offices and legal documents.

But citizenship is the political settlement that allows people with different identities and ancestries to live together as equals.

History explains who we are.

Citizenship determines how we live together.

Once citizenship ceases to be decisive, politics risks becoming an endless competition between historical grievances, ancestral claims and inherited counter-claims.

I have no desire to live in such a society.

The purpose of politics is not to settle every account left open by history. It is to provide justice, peace and common citizenship among the living.

Time is relentless. We inherit its consequences, but we do not get to reverse its verdicts.