The Institute coordinated a major five year research programme (1999-2005) into national identity and constitutional change, The Nations and Regions Research Programme. The programme was funded by the Leverhulme Trust. The Trust also funded the follow-up study National Identity, Citizenship and Social Inclusion (2006-10).
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Identity Briefings (pdfs to download)
This is the complete set of briefing reports on the Nations and Regions Research Programme (1999 - 2005)
National Identity, Citizenship and Social Inclusion 2006-11
Context
When we applied to the Trust in 1999 we said that the constitutional changes in the nations of the UK were likely to be 'the beginning rather than the end of decentralisation and new territorial relationships in these islands'. While subsequent events largely confirm this, in one important way there has been little change in Scotland. It was, in large measure, a strong sense of Scottish identity which created pressure for devolution. Unsurprisingly then, constitutional change has not triggered any sizeable change; people in Scotland feel no more and no less Scottish than before. That said, who is seen as English or Scottish has acquired a sharper edge since 1999, and constitutional change has to some extent altered the way the English in Scotland are seen and the way they see themselves.
Objectives
Geo-political changes have shifted the emphasis from the meaning of national identity to broader questions of identity, citizenship, exclusion and inclusion in areas such as immigration, race and ethnicity. We are beginning to understand how and why national identity at different times and different places takes a political or a cultural turn. We have developed a better grasp of the underlying reasons people have for articulating their sense of national identity in different ways in different contexts. These are the issues which we now study.
Significance and Originality
We are exploring issues of belonging, acceptance and inclusion in three contrasting but interlocking ways:
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extensive comparative survey work, of a kind never carried out before, in three locales: the Scottish Highlands & Islands, Scotland and Britain as a whole. We propose to make these three-way comparisons over time by conducting the survey work in 2006 and 2008. We aim to capitalise on two hitherto under-exploited approaches developed during the previous programme which builds on our qualitative work. Specifically, we wish to explore who is included/excluded in terms of identity markers such as birth, residence, ethnicity, descent, residence; the relationship between being British and being Scottish/English/Welsh, and the rights and benefits which derive from these.
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qualitative work in selected locations in the Highlands and Islands with an emphasis on the Gàidhealtachd. This will fill a notable lacuna in our territorial coverage, of longstanding interest. This work is being carried out by Dr James Oliver. Studying the Scottish Gàidhealtachd is potentially of great significance because, local identity competes with 'national' identity to affect perceptions of constitutional change, social inclusion and politics generally. The sense of local identity is likely to be highly influential, entwined with issues of language, attitudes to the land, and a sense of a culture which is in some ways unlike that found even in the more rural parts of the Central Belt, affected as it is by relative isolation, issues of transport both on land and sea, sometimes tension over the continuing role of Gaelic and a stronger sense of the residual impact of religion. The diversity of social and geographical origins in the Gàidhealtachd increases the significance of a study in this area.
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Social psychologists Steve Reicher (St Andrews) and Nicholas Hopkins (Dundee) have developed original ways of exploring the effects of social stimuli on what people think, feel and do. Sets of experimental studies will address the nature of national identity and the implications for social inclusion and social harmony, leading to a powerful and valid analysis of the effects of social stimuli on what people think, feel and do. These new studies address, in a methodologically distinct way, issues to be explored in the surveys.
Methods
(a) Survey work
The British Social Attitude Surveys enables us to compare Scotland, England
and Wales. Because these surveys use random sampling, inevitably
the number of cases in Scotland and, especially, Wales will be small
and the scope for detailed comparison restricted. In order to overcome
this, we included modules in the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey, and
commissioned a booster in selected parts of the Highlands and Islands,
where, by means of the booster sample, we are pursuing the same goals,
at least in the first wave of surveys in 2006. In 2008, we may vary the
approach in order to follow up specific ideas generated by the qualitative
study. Because of the highly dispersed population in these areas it is
likely that we shall follow a strategy of sampling from areas selected
to provide illuminating contrasts, rather than trying to cover the area
as a whole.
(b) Qualitative work in the Gàidhealtachd (Dr
James Oliver)
Qualitative work will once again concentrate on how people 'do' identity
in this area where the context is rather different from the places we
have studied previously. Only with qualitative work can we understand
the meanings and subtleties of national identity as lived and experienced
in everyday life. We have demonstrated the merits of this approach in
over a decade of research on national identity, and the proposed survey
work would not be possible without it.
(c) Experimental studies (Prof. Reicher and Dr Hopkins)
These draw upon a highly original and sophisticated methodological development
in the previous programme, the experimental work carried out by Reicher
and Hopkins leading to a powerful and valid analysis of the effects
of social stimuli on what people think, feel and do. These new studies
in part address, in a methodologically distinct way, issues to be explored
in the surveys.
Why The Leverhulme Trust?
The researchers are grateful to The Leverhulme Trust for funding this programme of research, and its previous support under its Nations and Regions programme. The Trust in particular appreciates how the researchers have developed their substantive ideas as well as relevant methodologies in order to get at what are complex issues of social, political and cultural life.
Publications and Papers(May 2005) |
Abell, J., Stevenson, C., Gibson, S., Locke, A. and Condor, S. (forthcoming), 'Trying similarity, perceiving difference: Interviewer self-disclosure as a research strategy', Qualitative Research. Condor, S., Abell, J., Figgou, L., Gibson, S. & Stevenson, C. (forthcoming), ''They're not racist ...' The denial, mitigation and suppression of ethnic and national prejudice in dialogue', British Journal of Social Psychology. Bond, R. and McCrone, D. (2004), 'The Growth of English Regionalism? Institutions and Identity', Regional and Federal Studies , vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 1-25. Bond, R. and Paterson, L. (forthcoming), 'Coming Down from the Ivory tower? Academics' Civic and Economic Engagement with the Community', Oxford Review of Education . Bond, R. and Rosie, M. (2002), 'National Identities in Post-Devolution Scotland', Scottish Affairs , No. 40, pp. 34-53. Bond, R., McCrone, D., Brown, A. (2003), 'National identity and economic development: reiteration, recapture, reinterpretation and repudiation', Nations and Nationalism , No. 9(3), pp. 371-391. Kiely, R., Bechhofer F. and McCrone D. (2005), 'Birth, Blood and Belonging: Identity claims in post-devolution Scotland', Sociological Review , vol. 53, No. 1. Kiely, R., McCrone, D. and Bechhofer F. (2005), 'Whither Britishness?', Nations and Nationalism , Vol 11, part 1. McCrone, D. and Paterson, L. (2002), 'The Conundrum of Scottish Independence', Scottish Affairs , No. 40, summer, pp. 54-75. Paterson L. (2002), 'Is Britain Disintegrating? Changing Views of 'Britain' After Devolution', Regional & Federal Studies , 12, pp. 21-42. Paterson, L, and Bond R. (forthcoming), 'Higher Education and Critical Citizenship: a Survey of Academics' Views in Scotland and England', Pedagogy, Culture and Society . Paterson, L. (2002), 'Governing from the centre: ideology and public policy', in J. Curtice, D. McCrone, A.Park and L. Paterson (eds), New Scotland, New Society?, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 196-218. Paterson, L. (2002), 'Social Capital and Constitutional Reform', in J. Curtice, D. McCrone, A. Park and L. Paterson (eds), New Scotland, New Society ?, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 5-32. Paterson, L. (2003), 'The Survival of the Democratic Intellect: Academic Values in Scotland and England', Higher Education Quarterly , 57, 67-93. Paterson, L. (forthcoming), 'Sources of support for the SNP', in C. Bromley, J. Curtice, D. McCrone, and A. Park (eds), Has Devolution Delivered? The New Scotland Four Years On . Rapport, N. (2003), 'The Computers as a Focus of Inattention: Five Scenarios concerning Hospital Porters', in C. Garsten and H. Wulff (eds), New Technologies at Work: People, Screens and Social Virtuality , Oxford: Berg. pp. 25-44. Rapport, N. (2004), 'From the Porter's Point of View: Participant-Observation by the Interpretive Anthropologist in the Hospital', in F. Rapport (ed), New Qualitative Methodologies in Health and Social Care Research , London: Routledge, pp. 99-122. Rapport, N. (forthcoming), ' 'Tensile nationalism': Nationalism as a quotidian discourse in a Scottish hospital', in C. Dahl-Jorgensen and N, Rapport (eds), Experiencing Work in Global Context . Rapport, N. (forthcoming), 'Bob, Hospital Bodybuilder: The Integrity of the Body, the Transitiveness of 'Work' and 'Leisure'', in S. Coleman and T. Kohn (eds), The Discipline of Leisure: Embodying Cultures of 'Recreation' . Oxford: Berghahn. Rapport, N. (forthcoming), 'On Well-being, Being Well and Well-becoming: On the Move with Hospital Porters', in A. Corsin-Jimenez (ed), Well-Being: Approaches from Anthropology , London: Plato. Rapport, N. (forthcoming), 'Participant Observation: A Case-Study in Humanistic Sense-Making', in D. Freshwater and A. Frank (eds), Handbook of Qualitative Health Research , London: Sage. Rapport, N. (forthcoming), 'The Experience of Anthropology: Working (-Out) with Bob', in J. Atkinson and M. Crowe (eds), Likely Stories: A Celebration of Research Approaches , London: Whurr. Rapport, N. (forthcoming), ''I may be an English bastard but I'm never lazy': The Fetich for Classification among Hospital Porters', in S. Chevalier, J. Edwards and S. Macdonald (eds), Ethnologie francaise (Special Issue 'Anthropology at Home in Britain') . Rosie, M. and Bond, R. (2003), 'Identity Matters: the Personal and Political Significance of Feeling Scottish', in C. Bromley, J. Curtice, K. Hinds and A. Park (eds), Devolution - Scottish Answers to Scottish Questions , Edinburgh; Edinburgh University Press. Rosie, M., MacInnes, J., Petersoo, P., Condor , S. and Kennedy, J. (2004), 'Nation speaking unto nation? Newspapers and national identity in the evolved UK', Sociological Review , No. 52, 4, PP. 437-458. Leverhulme Working PapersBond, R., 'National Identity and Exclusion'. Bond, R. and Rosie, M., 'National Identity in the Four Territories of the United Kingdom'. Condor, S., Abell, J. and Stevenson, C., 'English Attitudes to the Scottish Parliament'. Hopkins, N., Reicher, S. and Harrison, K., 'Cross-border relocation: place and identity in young people's deliberations on geographic mobility'. MacInnes, J., Rosie, M., Condor, S., Petersoo, P. and Kennedy, J., 'Where is the British National Press?' Reicher, S., Hopkins, N. and Harrison, K., 'Social Identity and Labour Mobility: two studies on the relationship between national category salience, the sense of home and willingness to relocate across national boundaries'. Rosie, M. and Bond, R., 'Routes into Scottishness'. Leverhulme Papers on the webAbell, J., Condor, S. and Stevenson, C., 'Experiences of Scots living in England', available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/forum/Leverhulme/pubs/scotsengland.html Bond, R., McCrone, D. and Brown, A., 'Constitutional Change and Economic Development', End of Project Report, available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/forum/Leverhulme/LEVC6.html Bond, R. and Rosie M., (2002) 'National Identities in Post-Devolution Scotland', available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/onlinepub/bondrosie.html Condor, S., ''Migrants and Nationals' Research Project: Summary of Findings in England', available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/forum/Leverhulme/pubs/migrantsnationails.html Hearn. J., 'Identity, Agency and Virtue: the Moral Life of a National Bank'. Paterson, L. (2003), 'The Survival of the Democratic Intellect: Academic Values in Scotland and England', available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/onlinepub/paterson/democrat_intell.html Paterson, L. and Bond R., 'Two Views of Education for Citizenship', available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/forum/Leverhulme/pubs/twoviews.html Rosie, M., MacInnes, J., Petersoo, P., Condor, S., and Kennedy, J. 'Where is the British National Press?' available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/forum/Leverhulme/LEVC5.html Rosie, M., MacInnes, J., Petersoo, P. and Condor S. 'Who are 'we'? National Identities in the 'British' Press', available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/forum/Leverhulme/LEVC5.html Rosie, M, Petersoo, P., MacInnes, J. and Condor, S. 'Nation speaking unto Nation? Newspapers and National Identity in the devolved UK', available online at http://www.institute-of-governance.org/forum/Leverhulme/LEVC5.html |
Summaries of project findings(online 7 March 2005) |
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Study 1 |
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Study 2a |
Individual
Inclusion and Exclusion: |
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Study 2b |
Individual
Inclusion and Exclusion: |
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Study 3 |
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Study 4 |
Academics and National Identity in Scotland and England summary |
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Study 5 |
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Study 6 |
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Introduction
| Objectives
and Significance |
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