Read summary of project findings
(online 7 March 2005)

Surveying public opinion (study 1) gives us broad and important benchmarks of change over time. It does not give us access to the detailed processes of identity claim, acceptance (or rejection), and change, or to the processes of boundary construction and maintenance. These in turn have consequences for social action in terms of social inclusion and exclusion, with policy implications as well as intellectual ones. Two projects in this part of the programme, in different ways address these processes: this study and Young People and Labour Mobility (study 2b).

The overall theme of this study is the question of how individuals negotiate entry and are received into national communities, with particular focus on:

• the degree to which different criteria of national community membership are voiced and receive support;

• the consequences for action of these constructions for English people in Scotland, Scots living in England and those born and living in these countries;

• the responses and strategies of those, such as ethnic groups, who are defined as national 'outsiders' as they attempt to negotiate entry into new national communities.

We are analysing and explaining the extent to which and the ways in which people's ideas about who belongs to the relevant nation change through time. We are particularly interested in the weight that is given to different criteria in defining national inclusion: how are factors such as blood, birth and ancestry weighted against factors like residence, choice and commitment? Will an assertion of Scottish and English identities to the detriment of British identity lead to an increased emphasis on blood criteria, and will this present problems for Scots negotiating entry and rights in England, for the English negotiating entry and rights in Scotland, as well as for Afro-Caribbean and Asian people negotiating entry and rights in both countries?

We do not at present understand these processes well enough even to favour one polar alternative over another. In some contexts the range of those defined as 'fellow nationals', as 'people-like-us', may increase, with the corollary that, say, English people in Scotland - or Scots living in England - are included and welcomed as members of the nation. However, in some contexts, more exclusionary definitions of national belonging may be articulated and acted upon. This is not just a matter of changing sociability in interpersonal relations. It may have systematic effects on the levels of hostility and discrimination shown against whole groups. It may not only shape and be shaped by the context in which 'the nation' is defined and articulated by public figures and elites, but affect the legitimacy of particular claims on resources (such as houses or jobs)

We are assembling and interviewing over period of four years a panel of respondents, Scots in England, English people in Scotland, and those born and resident in the two countries. We interviewed them first in 2000/1 shortly after the setting up of the Scottish parliament; in 2002/3, in the context of a British general election, the first in a devolved UK; and for a third time in 2004 around the time of the second Scottish parliamentary election. We have a panel of around 300 persons in all: 150 people living in Scotland and 150 in England, split in each case between north and south, and sub-divided into recent migrants (three years or less), longstanding migrants (more than ten years), and residents for comparative purposes. Our sample is stratified so as to incorporate those of different ages, genders, geographical locations (northern and southern England/central belt and northern Scotland), length of residence and different ethnicity. These are clearly not representative samples, but they are strategically chosen to complement the major surveys of public opinion by permitting analysis of a kind which is impossible using survey data alone. This part of the research provides essential depth complementing the major surveys of public opinion which we described in the previous section. The panel interviews allow us to look at how people construct national identity; their own experiences of seeking inclusion and facing exclusion; and their reactions to the claims of others to inclusion. Crucially we are able to analyse the processes as they occur in real time, taking advantage both of the strength of qualitative techniques for eliciting meaning, following up unanticipated issues of interest and so on, and the power of a panel design which allow us to study change at the individual level, and investigate why it takes place.

 

Introduction | Objectives and Significance Substantive Programme | Linked Studies and Timetable | Researchers Programme Management | Dissemination | Job Vacancies

Study 1 | Study 2b | Study 3 | Study 4 | Study 5 | Study 6

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Nations and Regions research programme
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Last modified: 7 March 2005
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