Enoch Powell,Parliament and Europe

In recent years, there has been substantial academic reappraisal of Enoch Powell alongside a growing public realisation, increased by the debate over Brexit, that his interests were wider than immigration and notably included opposition to British membership of the European Community – a topic that this article probes further. It begins by examining Powell's understanding of the British nation as a unitary state, centred on parliament, that underpinned his interpretation of both Conservatism and Unionism. Then, covering the period up to the 1975 referendum, the article analyses exactly how Powell argued that membership of the European Community threatened parliamentary sovereignty. It situates Powell's thinking in the context of arguments made by others and explores the connections made by Powell between the threat from Europe and the history of parliament itself, particularly the formation of the unions with Scotland and Ireland. The article shows that while Powell's arguments were marginalised in the later 1970s and for much of the 1980s, they were revived from the early 1990s – albeit in a changed constitutional context.     

Nation‐freezing: images of the nation and the migrant in citizenship packages

ABSTRACT. New nationalism differs from classical nationalism in terms of its content and focus. Whereas classical nationalism distinguishes itself from other nation‐states in defining its national identity, new nationalism distinguishes the ‘native’ national identity from that of its current and prospective citizens of migrant origin. The terms of integration thus become conditions of membership in the national community. Citizenship and integration policies emerge as central arenas where the discourse of new nationalism unfolds. This study looks into the discourses of cultural citizenship by studying the content of the official ‘citizenship packages’ – materials designed to welcome newcomers and assist them in their integration – in three Western European countries: The Netherlands, France and the UK. What images are depicted of the nation‐state and the migrant in citizenship packages, and (how) do these images freeze the nation?     

European Postcolonial Studies and Ireland: Towards a Conversation amongst the Colonized of Europe

In the 1980s, key Irish Studies scholars proposed that Irish culture, politics and economics – both past and present – are most usefully viewed in the context of imperialism, colonialism and anti-colonial nationalism. The result of this intervention is an Irish postcolonial studies which, over the past 35 years, has produced an influential body of scholarship premised on the idea that Ireland is a colony/former colony of the British Empire. Notwithstanding its considerable impact, Irish postcolonial studies has not been without its detractors, with the country's location within Europe forming the basis for one of most persistent objections to the application of a postcolonial framework to Ireland. Given the key role assigned to geography in the postcolonial debate in Ireland, this article explores the implications for Ireland of an emerging postcolonial critique centred on Europe. In addition to discussing the concept of internal colonisation as applied to such Western European countries as Italy and Britain, the article makes reference to postcolonial analyses of the region of Eastern and Central Europe and its relationship with both Russia and Western Europe. The article acknowledges that the branch of European postcolonial studies that focuses on uneven power relationships within and between European countries offers a useful challenge to the argument that Ireland should either be examined within a European framework or a postcolonial one, but argues that the categorisation of a greater number of European societies as colonies or former colonies raises important questions that require further debate.     

The arithmetic of defence policy

The Kosovo campaign of 1999 demonstrated unambiguously the weakness of European military forces. Recognition of the consequences of this lack of capability has put new vigour into the European defence debate. Yet decline in military capability is systemic in every European country. The Helsinki goals will do nothing to address this decline. National defence budgets over the past 15 years have been decreasing in real terms. Even if current aspirations to hold military spending levels were to be achieved, the decline in capabilities would continue. Military equipment and personnel costs rise faster than domestic inflation, and therefore fewer people and weapons systems can be afforded each year. There is no prospect of significant uplifts in defence budgets in Europe, despite the acknowledged need for a range of expensive enabling capabilities for post-Cold War operations. Palliative measures now on trial are unlikely to have a major impact. The only option for European nations is a progressive integration of their forces to realize the economies of scale that would allow effectiveness to be maintained. There are opportunities for initiatives that would produce short-term pay-offs. Despite the severe political difficulties of a long-term plan for integration, the alternative is worse. Trying to maintain sovereignty in defence provision will mean that the nations of Europe will eventually be unable either to meet the requirements of even their most modest security needs or to exercise any influence over US defence and security policies.     

坚守还是让渡——二战后英国人主权观述论

英国人对主权让渡的认识经历了较为复杂的过程:从欧洲一体化初期不愿让渡主权,到加入欧共体时出现"无关主权"、"共享主权"和"威胁主权"三种认知,之后逐渐形成主流共识:一方面,让渡部分主权、融入欧洲一体化有利于增进英国国家利益;但另一方面,无论"亲欧派"还是"疑欧派"都坚持英国的核心主权不可让渡的原则,并且不认同欧洲联邦是欧洲一体化的终结目标。英国政府采取务实主义的态度,既通过"非政治化"努力避免主权让渡成为与欧共体/欧盟合作的障碍,又坚守英国的法理主权地位,部分主权的让渡与否取决于对本国利益的权衡和国内政治的需要。英国人对主权让渡的"保守"态度是他们认知主权的一种"英国方式",但它并没有改变英国人的上述主流共识。     

Youth organizations and the reproduction of nationalism in Britain: the role of Urdd Gobaith Cymru

Youth organizations have long played significant roles in promoting particular forms of nationalism among young people in the UK. To date, however, academic studies of UK youth organizations have been Anglocentric, focusing on youth organizations associated with a hegemonic British state and imperial project. This paper seeks to show how youth organizations have also been used to promote alternative forms of nationalism in the UK, which have sought to challenge a British state and imperial project. Focusing explicitly on Wales, it examines how Urdd Gobaith Cymru – the Welsh League of Youth – has played a significant role over the past 90 years in promoting a Welsh and Welsh-speaking citizenship amongst Welsh youth. Drawing on documentary and archival research, the paper discusses how the organization has fostered particular practices and identities among its members and the way in which these have been challenged in recent years; most notably as a result of a decline in the numbers of Welsh speakers in Wales and changing configurations of the meanings of Welshness. The paper concludes by arguing for the need to take seriously the role played by youth organizations in helping to shape political geographies in a devolved Britain.     

Giuseppe Mazzini and the democratic logic of nationalism

ABSTRACT. This article brings the thought of Giuseppe Mazzini back into the field of nationalism studies, from which it has been largely missing for a half century. It suggests the following: that Mazzini is much more modern and secular than he is usually portrayed; and that his commitment to liberal policies while rejecting liberal principles suggests that the distinction between civic and ethnic nationalism has been misconceived. Nationalism, to Mazzini, was not an end in itself but a means to an end – government of, by and for the people. The demand for such a government was manifested in three popular demands in nineteenth‐century Europe: in the West as democracy, in the East as national sovereignty (the precondition for democracy) and in both East and West as social democracy. Thus nationalism may be instrumental rather than an end in itself, and it may be attributable not to ethnic groups' natural striving for autonomy but to the pursuit of democracy.     

Debating federal Europe in the British Parliament,c. 1940–49

Federalism, or the fear of it, worked as a catalyst in the British pre-referendum debate on Brexit in June 2016. In this paper, we focus on the pre-European integration context and ask what kind of an alternative federalism was seen to afford in British politics during and after the Second World War. We limit our discussion to parliamentary debates, which have only rarely been used as primary sources for studying European integration history. The British Parliament was one of the key political arenas for debates on foreign policy, not just in terms of informing the party lines but also guiding the public discussion. In the early part of the 1940s, the British federalist movement was able to generate political debate on the issue and gain the attention of many leading politicians. We argue that the approach to the use of the concept was politically charged but remained open to various context-based interpretations, which did not eventually lead to any concrete proposals. During the latter part of the 1940s, the majority of British MPs were open to different ways of creating unity in Europe. The emphasis on national sovereignty, however, continued. As a result ‘federalism’, attached to structures for unity, gave way to more pragmatic political solutions.     

Celebrating British multiculturalism,lamenting England/Britain's past

Drawing upon Littler and Naidoo's ‘white past, multicultural present’ alignment, this article examines English newspaper coverage of two ‘British’ events held in 2012 (the Diamond Jubilee and the London Olympic Games). In light of recent work on English nationalism, national identity and multiculturalism, this article argues that representations of Britain oscillated between lamentations for an English/British past – marred by decline – and a present that, while being portrayed as both confident and progressive, was beset by latent anxieties. In doing so, ‘past’ reflections of England/Britain were presented as a ‘safe’ and legitimate source of belonging that had subsequently been lost and undermined amidst the diversity of the ‘present’. As a result, feelings of discontent, anxiety and nostalgia were dialectically constructed alongside ‘traditional’ understandings of England/Britain. Indeed, this draws attention to the ways in which particular ‘versions’ of the past are engaged with and the impact that this can have on discussions related to multiculturalism and the multiethnic history of England/Britain.     

A. V. Dicey and English constitutionalism

The jurist A. V. Dicey’s study of the Law of the Constitution (1885) has been since its publication the dominant analysis of the British constitution and the source of orthodoxy on such subjects as parliamentary sovereignty and the rule of law. This canonical status has obscured the originality of Dicey’s ideas in the history of legal and political thought. Dicey reworked the traditional idea of sovereignty into two separate concepts – legal and political sovereignty – in order to square the common law notion of the sovereignty of parliament with the democratic idea of the sovereignty of the people. He forged a new concept – ‘the rule of law’ – to explain the legal basis of liberty in common law countries in a manner that was both Benthamite and constitutionalist. Finally, he provided a democratic and anti-federalist rationale for maintaining the Union of Great Britain and Ireland. This majoritarian, centralist and utilitarian constitutionalism has been one of the most enduring products of Victorian scholarship. This article seeks to recover it in its original context and, in so doing, to show the value of reintegrating legal thought into the mainstream of modern British history and the history of political thought.     

Nebulous nationalism: Walker Connor in an era of rising populism

Walker Connor's extensive writings on nationalism covered a wide range of issues and an even wider range of societies, from North America to Western Europe, from the countries of the Communist bloc to the evolving forms of identity and affiliation throughout the postcolonial, developing world. No theme in his work is perhaps more salient than his critical distinction between state and nation, one that was so often blurred by a loose terminology that saw political units and forms of ethnic identity as synonymous. For Connor, this sin was perpetrated by both academic scholars and general writers and led to a lack of appreciation of one of the foremost forces – what he called ethno‐nationalism – shaping the contemporary world.     

Brexit or Bremain: what future for the UK's European diplomatic strategy?

A major public debate on the costs and benefits of the United Kingdom's membership of the European Union is presently under way. The outcome of the referendum on 23 June 2016 will be a pivotal moment in determining whether the EU has a future as a component of the UK's European diplomatic strategy or whether there is a major recalibration of how the UK relates to Europe and more widely of its role within international relations. Since accession to the European Economic Community the UK has evolved an uncodified, multipronged European diplomatic strategy. This has involved the UK seeking to reinforce its approach of shaping the security of the continent, preserving a leading diplomatic role for the UK in managing the international relations of Europe, and to maximize British trade and investment opportunities through a broadening and deepening of Europe as an economically liberal part of the global political economy. Since accession the UK's European diplomatic strategy has also been to use membership of the EU to facilitate the enhancement of its international influence, primarily as a vehicle for leveraging and amplifying broader national foreign and security policy objectives. The strategy has been consistent irrespective of which party has formed the government in the UK. Increasing domestic political difficulties with the process of European integration have now directly impacted on this European strategy with a referendum commitment. Whether a vote for a Brexit or a Bremain, the UK will be confronted with challenges for its future European strategy.     

European democracy deferred: de Gaulle and the Dehousse Plan, 1960

Abstract

This article examines the first debate within the European Economic Community (EEC) over democracy following the Treaty of Rome. The treaty called for the newly created European Parliament to draw up a proposal for direct, transnational parliamentary elections. A plan in 1960 led by Fernand Dehousse emerged as the consensus choice. Charles de Gaulle, however, opposed the plan and succeeded in defeating it. We see during the1960 debate over the Dehousse Plan competing interpretations of democracy in European unity that still frame the issue today. At stake was the democratic character of the new EEC as well as the proper role of the public in the uniting of Europe. Should the public vote on matters of European integration via transnational parliamentary elections, national referendums or neither? By analytically reconstructing the key participants’ democratic worldviews, the article contributes to developing a deeper understanding of the debate over direct elections to the European Parliament, a fuller comprehension of the early life of the Treaty of Rome and a sharper realisation of the essential interconnectedness of the development of the EEC and the resumption of national democracy in post-WWII Western Europe.     

‘But Private Notes for My Own Memory’? Parliamentary Diaries,Parliamentary History and the Politics of Information in Early Stuart England*

Early modern parliamentary diaries are a standard source for historians, and have long been used as a supplement to the official journals in reconstructions of debates and business at Westminster. This article adopts a contrasting approach and examines what diaries – viewed as sources in their own right – reveal about parliament and its members, methods of contemporary note-taking, and the circulation and readership of political information. It begins with a review of the evidence for why, how, and to what ends members kept parliamentary diaries, before exploring the extent of their dissemination in early Stuart England. While recent literature has emphasized the circulation of materials relating to Jacobean and especially Caroline parliaments during the early 17th century, the article recovers the existence of a simultaneous interest in the parliamentary proceedings of the Elizabethan era. At a time when the future of parliament seemed uncertain, it argues that the evident market for, and readership of, Elizabethan material reflects contemporaries’ increasing recognition of parliament's significance within the English state and their changing attitudes towards parliamentary history. Moreover, while Elizabethan parliamentary diaries and journals seemingly reinforced memories of a past ‘golden age’ of parliamentary rule, the article contends that contemporaries’ production, dissemination, and reading of that material was a conscious form of political action in response to the constitutional crisis of their day.     

The collapse of British foreign policy

British foreign policy has tried to balance between the United States and continental Europe for the past half-century, with an unambiguous commitment to a special relationship with Washington and an ambiguous commitment to European integration. New Labour has followed its predecessors in this, claiming that Britain can act as a bridge between America and Europe, or as a pivot around which transatlantic relations turn. In the wake of the Iraq war, deepened scepticism in Washington about whether close European cooperation is in America's interest, and scepticism across continental Europe that Britain can or should act as a privileged interlocuteur, have undermined both ends of the bridge on which British foreign policy claims to rest. The end of US commitment to Atlanticism, together with post-Cold War divergence between US and European interests and values, should have led to a shift in British priorities towards closer cooperation with other major European states and-from that shared perspective-an attempt to reconstruct a more balanced transatlantic relationship. The EU presents a sadly weak framework for such a strategy; but Britain's domestic debate, in which this government-like its predecessors-has allowed a Eurosceptic press to shape the language of foreign policy, has made it more difficult for any government to change direction. Recent government speeches on foreign policy, however, suggest that ministers still cling to the illusion that Britain has a 'unique' position between Europe and the United States.     

‘United by blood’: race and transnationalism during the Belle Époque

The Belle Époque, often thought to be a period defined by nationalism, also saw the remarkable global proliferation of transnational affinities – especially those centred on race. Across Europe and its settler territories, notions of pan‐racial affinity spread alongside imperial nationalism, in the context of technological advancement that permitted novel imaginative possibilities. Meanwhile, texts of political imagination in Africa and Asia during this period – particularly those of pan‐Africanism and pan‐Islamism – demonstrate not only an awareness of the significance of racial thinking for Europe but a theorisation of the connections between Europe's racial imagination and its policies in the colonised world. The same advances in the fields of communication and travel that opened the door for new imaginative possibilities in Europe also enabled disparate communities in the colonised world to conceive of themselves, often for the first time, as collectively racialised subjects of a European world order.     

Writing Scottish Parliamentary History,c.1500–1707

In the 19th and 20th centuries, scholarship on the Scottish parliament was heavily informed by a narrative of ‘failure’, directed at explaining why its members voted it out of existence in 1707. Part of the problem was the tendency to see any deviation from the practices of the Westminster parliament as weakness. By reappraising parliament in terms of its utility to those who comprised its membership, notably the titled peerage and the monarch, historians have revealed its adaptability and inventiveness, especially in times of crisis. This essay considers how fresh approaches both to what constituted the parliamentary record and what can – and cannot – be found within it have exerted a transformative influence on our understanding of parliament's evolving role in Scottish political life. Although the Reformation crisis of 1560 and the accession of the ruling house of Stewart to the English throne in 1603 effected profound changes on parliamentary culture, this essay emphasises how parliament sustained its legitimacy and relevance, in part, by drawing on past practices and ideas. Historians have become more attentive in recent years to the means by which social groupings ordinarily excluded from formal parliamentary activity were nonetheless able to engage with, and influence, its proceedings. Gaps remain in our knowledge, however. Some periods have been more intensively studied than others, while certain aspects of parliamentary culture are understudied. The writing of Scottish parliamentary history will continue to offer rich possibilities in future.     

Detour to Europe: Enlargement,Southeast Europe,and the EU's External Dynamic

An American geographer with extensive field and research experience in Southeast Europe examines the implications of "enlargement fatigue" for Southeast European states aspiring to EU accession. He argues that progress toward EU enlargement into Southeast Europe and further integration through the EU Constitution is no longer restricted to internal (intra-EU) dynamics of widening and deepening, but rather must be complemented by an "external dynamic" involving a coherent EU foreign policy. This "external dynamic" would focus on promoting peace and stability on EU borders and quelling the external factors contributing to popular dissent within EU against expansion and integration. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F02, O15, O18, O19. 1 figure, 41 references.     

Choosing between America and Europe: a new context for British foreign policy

Power in Britain has changed hands from a prime minister who sought to balance intense UK‐US consultation on foreign policy with the ambition to be ‘at the heart of Europe’ to one whose approach towards both the United States and the European Union has yet to be tested. It is an appropriate moment, there fore, to assess how these two contextual poles of British foreign policy‐making have changed over recent years and what this might mean for UK foreign policy choices. The premise of this article is that the days are now largely over when the UK can or should start out by trying to build an Anglo‐US position on a foreign policy challenge before trying to tie in the European and transatlantic positions. The UK is now a central player in the development of increasingly activist European foreign policies, whether these can later be coordinated effectively with the United States or not. A strong, bilateral relationship continues to serve the interests of both sides on multiple levels, but this relationship does not sit upon the same foundations as during the Cold War. There are now significant underlying factors, especially since the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001 in the US and July 7 2005 in the UK, that pull the US away from Europe and the UK, while pushing the UK towards Europe as the first port of call in developing foreign policy strategies. It is also notable that, today, UK positions on most global issues and foreign policy challenges tend to conform more closely to the dominant EU line than to the United States. On balance, the UK might think about European integration more from a US than from a European perspective, but it now thinks about global problems more from a European than from a US or transatlantic perspective.     

英国模式、江南道路与资本主义萌芽

以往的世界近现代史研究一向认为西欧的发展道路具有放之四海而皆准的普遍意义。所谓西欧道路其实主要是英国模式 ,其核心即工业革命体现的经济变革。但近年欧洲经济史研究的最新成果证明 ,英国模式有其特殊性 ,即使在欧洲也不具有普遍意义。中国的资本主义萌芽理论是建立在英国模式基础上的。通过对英国模式和中国明清江南模式的比较 ,可以发现 ,如果没有西方的入侵 ,江南几乎不可能出现英国式的近代工业革命。资本主义萌芽理论研究陷入困境 ,实际上是套用英国模式的结果