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The Many Englands: implications for UK devolution, the Council of the Isles and a more federal Europe

Simon Partridge is a political analyst, writer and broadcaster focussing on British-Irish relations, devolution, identity politics and post-nationalism. His Catalyst pamphlet The British Union State: imperial hangover or flexible citizens' home? and his web articles "The Irish diaspora and devolved democracy in the British-Irish islands" and "The Council of the Isles: Nordic Inspirations" can be accessed via http://www.google.com by searching "Simon Partridge".

His paper The British-Irish Council: the trans-islands symbolic and political possibilities was given as part of the Looking into England conference.

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This paper is based on the presentation I gave to the 10th Freudenstadt Symposium "Region and Nation in the British Irish Islands: Innovations and New Institutions from a European Perspective" on 1 July 2000. The annual symposium in Baden-Wurttemburg focuses on the "European regions" and is organised jointly by The Friedrich Ebert Foundation and the Department of British and Irish Studies at the University of Tubingen. This paper is the Copyright (C) of Simon Partridge, but may be freely reproduced for non-profit purposes provided that my authorship is acknowledged in any reproduction or reference.

Professor Christopher Harvie, director of the Department of British and Irish Studies, University of Tubingen, has asked me to reflect on the question "how many Englands?" and its wider political implications. On the one hand, I'm glad that he has recognised the plurality of Englands, on the other hand, as we say in British-English, "how long is a piece of string?" Or as Linda Colley, eminent historian and author of "Britons: Forging the Nation" (pun intended) put it in her influential Millenium Lecture (1) at No 10 Downing Street at the end of last year - "the infinitely diverse polity of Britain".

Perhaps the first thing I should do is point out that England is not Britain (Great Britain to be pedantic), and Britain is not the state called the United Kingdom, which includes Northern Ireland. England may be several "states of mind" but it is not a state, and in my view is most unlikely to become one. And to be quite accurate England is not even England, because it has its own "Celtic fringe" called Cornwall, the peninsula of the south west beyond the river Tamar. This was incorporated into the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Edmund in 944, and as I suggested in my pamphlet "The British Union State" (2), this could well be viewed as the start of the Union.

Indeed, it is questionable whether there has ever been a unified English state. There certainly has not been one in any modern democratic sense, because not long after the establishment of the West Saxon-based kingdom - which had taken over from an earlier Northumbrian Angle-based one (the enduring basis for the North) - the Normans appeared on the scene and in a remarkably short space of time totally transformed the political map of the islands of the north east Atlantic.

As the historian Hugh Kearney put it in his pioneering history of the Isles (3), published ten years before the Norman Davies "big volume" (4) (better in my view, apart from his unproblematic use of "British Isles", though he had wanted to call it a "multi-cultural history"): "The Norman successes created a French-speaking ascendancy throughout the British Isles." - an empire which also included Aquitane in what is now France, and which lasted for some 250 years. The infamous mid-14th century Statutes of Kilkenny (5), was an attempt to prevent the Norman Ascendancy in southern Ireland - not Anglo-Saxons - from intermarrying with the "enemy" Irish aristos. If there has never been a purely English state, is it possible to excavate a unified "English" from Britishness (a word derived from the Welsh/Brythonic "Prydeinig", be it noted) and the remnants of its Empire?

My own view is that the answer is No. That even if we wished to - and I do not - we cannot simply turn back the historical clock to the 9th and 10th centuries. And I say this with some confidence, because various concerted efforts have been made over the past couple of years to kick the putative sleeping dog of English cultural and political nationalism into some sort of life (6) - including William Hague's floating of the idea of an English parliament, which he quickly dropped. The people of contemporary England, to their credit, remain resolutely uninterested - unless the issue has some resonance of the football field and its lumpen hooliganism. While this gets understandable media attention it is hardly a reliable barometer of wider opinion.

The best I can do is to try to identify a number of Englands and suggest how they might take on political expression in the light of devolution, and under the pressure of developments across the islands - notably the Council of the Isles, part of the Belfast Agreement - and in response to wider more federal developments in the EU.

Having already noted the non-England of Cornwall ("-wall" and "Wales" are derived from the Anglo-Saxon for "foreigner", or in modern parlance the "other"), the first England we might look at is the rather strangely named Home Counties, which cluster around the great ex-imperial metropolis of London. There are good indications that this is where the essence of "Englishness" resides if we define it as a sort of monarchical, pastoral quaintness. In 1991 the social geographer P Taylor (7) mapped the main markers:

- Natural landscapes - Picturesque villages - Quaint towns - Harbours and boats of a maritime people - Cathedrals, Churches and Colleges - Palaces, large houses, castles

As John Mohan later commented: "this pattern is dominated by the Home Counties and this applies to other key elements in the social hierarchy such as the major public schools and important cultural and social events and venues." (8) But this is obviously far from being "geographical England". Indeed, if this is England then most of England is something else. But nine times out of ten when you hear, particularly from the London-based media, commentators and literary folk, talk of England, it is the Home Counties that is being referred to.

But now out of the Home Counties let us extract Greater London, with its population of seven million or so, larger than most of the smaller European nation-states. It now has its own elected Assembly and Mayor, the ex-boss of the Greater London Council and now independent, left of new Labour, Ken Livingstone. London is now a city region state, akin to Berlin, Hamburg and Bremen in the Federal Republic, and taking its place alongside the less populated Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

I live in London, although I was brought up on a farm in one of the Home Counties, East Sussex, so along with many others I am a settler. The largest group are those of Irish extraction - a quarter of a million, around 5% of Ireland's population! Alongside are many people of South Asian and Afro-Caribbean origin, plus numerous other smaller minorities. A fifth of the population today, and probably nearer a third by the end of the first decade of this century, are non-European minorities. Most of these people - myself included - would say they are Londoners or British before they would admit to being English, which few black and Asian people do. And in this multiple allegiance they would be typical of the inhabitants of Britain - though as you might expect, the further away you are from the Home Counties, the more emphasis you are likely to place on your national or regional/local allegiance. (9)

Let's cast our net wider and see who lives in the rest of geographic England. Well, 7-8 million people of Irish extraction for a start. They started coming in large numbers in the middle of the last century, pushed by famine and pulled by the burgeoning industrial revolution. They are focused in the Clyde, North West, West Midlands and Greater London. (10)

Then there are the English-born in Wales and Scotland: according to the 1991 census nearly 20% of the population of Wales and 8% of the population of Scotland. In the other direction 16% (743,000) of Scots live in England, along with a quarter of the population (545,000) of Wales. The urban English seem to be escaping to the rural periphery, while many of the periphery's inhabitants seem to prefer the bright lights of the city - perhaps a fair exchange. On top of this internal migration we have a South Asian and Afro-Caribbean derived population in excess of three million, not to mention the now many multi-coloured people of mixed relationships.

Darcus Howe, the West Indian-born social commentator, recently did a series for Channel 4 called the "White Tribe" - a counter-anthropology in which he went in search of the "white English". When he did find them they mostly, to his evident disappointment, seemed mired in popular American culture - "line dancing" seemed all the rage in the Midlands! But as Tom Nairn commented in discussion with Howe recently on the theme "Farewell Britannia" (11), the "white tribe" is not very white any more. Another substantial reason why it will be impossible to reconstruct some notional traditional Englishness.

I consider the search for a unitary English identity essentially the search for a chimera. It is an interesting academic past-time, but it will yield endless complexity (12) rather than any workable political dividends. In my considerable experience, not even English regionalists who have been beavering away for three decades now can agree where their different "regions" begin and end. I think it is this very diffuseness and differentiation which should reassure the southern Irish that the "English" are most unlikely to gang up on them in any Council of the Isles. If anything it is more likely to be the rest .v. the overbearing Home Counties.

In the face of this evident diversity I would like to introduce the functional and, in some places, rather bureaucratically derived eight official "regions of England": North East, North West, Yorkshire & Humberside, West Midlands, East Midlands, South West, South East, and Eastern (13). Interestingly, these regions started to take on life under the last Tory government when Michael Heseltine realised that there was a need for greater co-ordination of central government in its regional capacity after the riots on Merseyside. The Government Offices of the Regions (GOR) were born, the only difference being that Labour merged the office for Merseyside with the North West.

What Labour has added to the GORs - from April 1999 - are a series of Regional Development Agencies (RDA), business-led and focusing on economic development and training. London also has a Development Agency under the direction of the Assembly and Mayor. Supervising the RDAs elsewhere are what is called a Regional Chamber. The Chambers are indirectly elected bodies made up of predominantly local councillors with some participation from other social partners, like higher education and the Voluntary Sector - usually around 50-60 in number. Indeed, the considerable non-governmental sector has rapidly reorganised itself into regional networks to take account of this new political framework, evidence of the "pull effect" of the new regional structures.

The big question is, are these Regional Chambers going to evolve into directly elected assemblies on a par at least with Wales and Northern Ireland? That might be an easier question to answer if current parallel moves to reform local government had not included a strong push for big city mayors. Powerful mayors in, say, Liverpool and Manchester might cut across a North West region.

There is a vigorous debate in the Labour Party at the moment - partly between Blair who seems to favour mayors and Prescott who favours the larger regions - as to whether it should include a commitment in its next election manifesto to hold referendums in the English regions to test where there is a demand for a regional assembly (see Postscript). If that demand is not answered in the affirmative, then the advent of elected regional government in England is likely to be considerably delayed. However, it is not likely to go away since there are now Constitutional Conventions - modelled on the one that worked for 10 years to bring a Parliament back to Scotland - in the North East, North West, Yorkshire/Humberside, and stirrings in the West Midlands and South West. And these campaigns are now co-ordinated by a body called the Campaign for the English Regions (14), which launched last year and is based in Newcastle.

Internal devolution in England would clearly leave the new constitutional settlement in a more symmetrical and stable shape - defuse the infamous West Lothian question which could give undue influence to non-English MPs in English affairs at Westminster. This is likely to proceed in a "rolling fashion" as has happened in Spain - the state most comparable to the UK in Europe. The 17 "autonomous communities" of Spain have drawn down somewhat different powers in negotiation with the central Spanish government - Catalonia and the Basque country having very extensive autonomy. In England the process is likely to start in the North East and North West, spurred on by developments in nearby Scotland and Wales, with the south eastern area being the last.

However, there are two external factors which are also likely to affect devolution within England. The first is the Council of the Isles, launched last December as part of the Good Friday Agreement (15), then suspended and now running again - a second meeting is due to take place in Dublin. If sectarian-divided Northern Ireland with a population of just over 1.5m can make a success of devolution, this should add impetus to England's much larger regions.

It would be much easier to represent England's 49m population on the Council of the Isles if it was divided into 8 or 9 regions - in which case, as already mentioned, England (with some special provision for Cornwall) should appear much less threatening to the other 8 smaller constituent parts. This would be much more like returning to the pre-Wessex Heptarchy - the so-called seven kingdoms of the Angles and the Saxons before their destabilisation by invading Vikings and Danes (16), rather than the proto-imperium established by Alfred the Great. In my view, the Anglocentricity and countervailing resentments which bedevilled British-Irish relations for so long (though seldom with the intensity of the last 30 years) has really been a metropolitan/Home Counties-centricity, hence the enduring obsession with London in Irish eyes; a centre simultaneously "hated and imitated".(17) Indeed, if we are to add a parliamentary dimension to the Council as the Agreement recommends, then it is hard to see otherwise how England can be represented without dominating the rest. Though there is scope for some trade-off between the Republic as an independent state and the only autonomous English regions - the former could be "over-represented" and the latter "under-represented".

However, we should also bear in mind the new nature of the Council as a "political animal". It is going to be a comparatively soft political body where "accommodating conventions" should be more important than voting, which should be a last resort where consensus cannot be reached. I would like the Council to invite the English Regional Chambers - and the London Assembly/Mayor - to be present as "observers" right away. I believe the "Celtic fringe" would be pleasantly surprised to find many of their concerns shared by the English peripheries, while London has its own pockets of intense poverty and its strong Irish connection.

The second is the European dimension of increasing integration (but Europe may also have things to learn from a flexible, workable, representative Council of the Isles). With the recent intervention of Foreign Minister Fischer and President Chirac, the design of the European house is clearly back on the agenda, but I doubt we are as close to "finalite" as the French seem to imply. The great unresolved question - if we leave the issue of the Euro on one side for the moment, though they are undoubtedly related - is, what should be the "basic political unit" of the European political project? Is it to be a region or small nation (state or non-state); or is it to be the state, whether large, small or even micro (like Luxemburg)?

I submit that the underlying principle of democratic subsidiarity demands a move in the direction of a federal-type, two-tier Union. In my view such a Europe cannot be constructed from the existing states, because some are so large the resulting asymmetry would render the subsequent political structure unbalanced, lacking in legitimacy and ultimately unworkable. This does not mean that we have to strive for an impossible symmetry (some states of the USA are much larger than others), but neither can we ignore forever the problems posed by gross asymmetry.

Yet, I don't see how we Europeans move beyond the present uneasy quasi- confederation of states without the present non-devolved large states - fundamentally France, the England part of the UK, and in the future Poland - passing through a process of genuine devolution. And I don't see how such a process can be carried through in much under 15 years.

To talk of a "core" or "pioneers" seems to me more a nostalgic return to the Common Market of the Six, rather than a bold step into the future. With its easy implications of a Franco-German hegemony (those two historic enemies for the British), it will be music to the ears of William Hague and I think could cause immense problems for Blair in any referendum on the Euro. This potential "Directoire" should also set warning bells ringing in the smaller member states like the Irish Republic.

Now may be absolutely the time to relaunch the idea of the "Europe of small nations and regions", because the alternative is likely to be European constitutional incoherence leading to a crisis in political legitimacy, regardless of economic imperatives (the crisis will be compounded if these imperatives impact differentially, as seems likely, across Europe, creating new "core-periphery" problems). A Europe of the Regions as an evolutionary project would appeal to the pragmatic realism of the English regions and could give them a further exogenous "pull". There is an opportunity here to create a virtuous political circle where greater European integration of the appropriate sort can work hand-in-hand with the unfinished business of devolution in England. However, it needs a certain patience and depends strongly on the "federal idea" being taken seriously (18). The paced, purposeful construction of a new polity, rather the leaving it to the play of so-called predetermined currency and market forces. (19)

In this way we could bring into being a Europe really connected to its peoples, giving expression to their continental civic solidarity while respecting their cultural variety. And there is no reason why such a polity should necessarily be at loggerheads, particularly in the civic dimension, with that other great continent-wide federation across the Atlantic, the USA. (20)

Postscript

The National Policy Forum (NPF) of the Labour Party backed a firm commitment by Labour to elected regional government at a crucial meeting in Exeter on the 8th July 2000. The support of the Forum is significant in the run up to the next general election, since the documents agreed will form a major part of the Labour Party manifesto.The documents tabled for the meeting were strengthened by amendments from Forum members. The document now states: "Labour recognises the legitimate aspirations of the English regions and believes that the creation of elected regional assemblies is the essential next step in our programme of renewing the constitution and empowering citizens." But this positive step forward was tempered by the reintroduction into Labour thinking of a link between the reorganisation of local government before the introduction of regional government.The timetable for necessary legislation was firmed up but no definite commitment on time scale was agreed. The document will now include reference to progress "as soon as practicable" and "as soon as possible".Chair of CFER, John Tomaney, commented. "Labour now shares with the Liberal Democrats a clear policy promise. We will be working hard to ensure that all parties live up to their promises in the run up to the next election and in the next Parliament". Jane Thomas, Director of the Campaign for Yorkshire and the Humber, commented, "The support of the NPF for regional devolution has been heartening. I am sure that the Labour leadership will listen to the message from their own members - finish the job of constitutional reform by devolving power to the English regions".

The North West Constitutional Convention also took a major step forward at the most recent full Convention meeting held in Manchester on 6 July 2000. It agreed that an interim report, "New Way Forward - No Way Back" (available from Steve Machin: s.machin@wiganmbc.gov.uk) would form the basis of further consultation in the region. The report, which lays out options for the future governance of the region, is the distillation of the deliberations of the four working groups of the Convention. The Convention will agree a final position at the next meeting in September.

Simon Partridge
Email: 101723.463@compuserve.com

Notes and Links

1. Britishness in the 21st Century, 8 December 1999; www.number-10.gov.uk

2. The British Union State: imperial hangover or flexible citizens' home?, Catalyst, 1999, p.7; www.catalyst-trust.co.uk

3. Kearney, H. The British Isles: A History of Four Nations, Cambridge University Press, 1989, p.80

4. Davies, N. The Isles: A History, Macmillan, 1999

5. Kearney, H. The British Isles: A History of Four Nations, p.134, op. cit.

6. See, for example, Heffer, S. Nor Shall My Sword: The Reinvention of England, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1999

7. Mohan, J. A United Kingdom?: Economic, Social and Political Geographies, Arnold, 1999, see Fig. 2.1, p.30

8. Ibid., p. 29

9. See the Local Government Survey by Miller W. which argues that identities are not exclusive categories. "The periphery and its paradoxes", West European Politics 21, 1998, pp.167-196 Also, Ibid., p.30

10. The Conditions of the Working Class in England, Classics in Politics: Marx and Engels, ElecBook, London, 1998, p.161. And Kearney, H. The British Isles: A History of Four Nations, p.202, op. cit.

11. ‘The substance of Tom Nairn's Barry Amiel & Norman Melburn Trust Lecture on 6 June 2000, reflections on the move from an ethno-national to a civic Isles’, is due for publication in New Left Review.

12.For good evidence of this complexity see the recent British Council report of the week-long, December 1999 conference "Looking into England". Available on request from: naomi.clift@britishcouncil.org, or from www.britishcouncil.org/studies/england/

13. See www.britishcouncil.org/studies/graphics/regions/gif for Simon Partridge's map of the "Countries, Regions and Crown Dependencies of the British-Irish Isles".

14. See www.cfer.org.uk/

15. "Up to the time of the Vikings, Irish civil organisation was marked by a cellular, un-centralist structure. It was, in fact, resistance to the Norsemen that provoked the need for a model of high-kingship to overcome the indigenous tradition of political disunity. Thus as D A Binchy points out, the rise of the Tara monarchy in Ireland found a striking parallel in the rise of the national monarchy in England as the house of Wessex also sought to resist the Danes. In other words, it was largely the Norse invasions of Britain and Ireland that evoked among the native populations 'that sense of "otherness" which lies at the basis of nationalism'. Binchy concludes accordingly that the political reality of high-kingship is relatively late, superseding the long tradition of the Pentarchy or 'Fifth Province' which conceived of unity as a spiritual-cultural rather than political-governmental phenomenon." Kearney, R. Postnationalist Ireland, Routledge, 1997, p. 102. Binchy D. A. in The Impact of the Scandinavian Invasions on the Celtic-speaking Peoples c.800-1100 AD, ed. Brian O Cuiv, Dublin, 1975, p. 128

16. See Partridge, S. "The British-Irish Council: the trans-islands symbolic and political possibilities", www.britishcouncil.org/studies/england/partridge.htm

17. As the first President of the Irish Free State, Douglas Hyde, put it, "The English are the people we love to hate and never cease to imitate." See Kearney, R. Postnationalist Ireland, p.88, op. cit.

18. For a challenging view of this through the unlikely eyes of Edmund Burke, see Joachim Schwend’s "The federal option for the UK", his paper to the "Looking into England" Conference, www.britishcouncil.org/studies/england/schwend.htm

19. As my Catalyst pamphlet argued, we have reached the limit of the technocratic "functionalist approach from above", p.20, www.catalyst-trust.co.uk

20. Jonathan Freedland has pointed to the radical English/British roots of the American federal republic in Bring Home the Revolution: The Case for a British Republic, Fourth Estate, 1998

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