Perpetuating Britishness

Rhetorical strategies of political leaders in a nation state under threat

Dados Bibliográficos

ID6084579
AutoresE Margaret Crawford (autor correspondente), Ewan Crawford
Ano2015
Volume14
Fascículo6
Páginas729-750
Data de publicação2015-12-31
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoJournal of Language and Politics (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1569-2159 • E-ISSN: 1569-9862
EditoraJohn Benjamins Publishing Company (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1075/jlp.14.6.01cra
OpenAlexW2330810265
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas1
Referências citadas16

In 1999 a devolved Scottish Parliament was established within the United Kingdom following a referendum two years earlier. The current governing party in that Parliament – the SNP – held a referendum on Scottish independence in September 2014, which resulted in a decision to stay within the UK. However, during the referendum campaign promises were made by the main UK parties to transfer further power away from the British Parliament at Westminster to the Scottish Parliament in the hope this would satisfy demands for greater self-government in Scotland. This paper analyses the rhetoric of the leaders of Britain’s two main political parties in an effort to detect strategies used to construct and perpetuate Britishness in the context of devolution and a threat to the British state. It finds a number of discursive strategies deployed to promote unity and difference to (non-British) others. It also suggests the apparent need by British political leaders to deploy such British-constructivist strategies involves avoiding even acknowledging the reality of a major constitutional reform such as devolution and therefore political difference between the nations of the UK

Britishness · Context (archaeology · Devolution (biology · Framing (construction · Home rule · Independence (probability theory · Parliament · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Referendum · Scots law · Sociology · Commonwealth, Australian Politics and Federalism · Political Systems and Governance · Scottish History and National Identity · History · Law · Public Administration