Category: sovereignty
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Towards a Gender-Critical Nationalism
Peter Ramsay reviews a new book that explains the transnational character of queer politics and the national character of gay and women’s rights. Book Review: Alexander Stoffel, Eros and Empire: The Transnational Struggle for Sexual Freedom in the United States (Stanford University Press, 2025) (Long read) The revelation earlier this year that the gender ideologists…
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Ethnonationalism: Last Refuge of Globalism
Philip Cunliffe thinks we have no national interest in ethnonationalism. (Long read) Ethnonationalism has reared its head in British politics, sowing division on the Right and providing vindication once again for the Left’s perennial prophecy of a looming fascist menace. It is an unsurprising development. As the electorate has grown increasingly frustrated by the failure…
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Britain Against the Yookay: Nation Against Empire
Philip Cunliffe identifies the source of the increasing fragmentation of British politics and society in the imperial structures of the state, and its long experience of relying on devolved government and sectarianism to frustrate the national self-determination of the colonised. We live in the Yookay. Everyone instantly recognises their lives and surroundings in the social…
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Geopolitics at the End of the End of History
Lee Jones recently spoke to a conference of logistics professionals about the rapid changes in global politics. He argued that the current chaos is the result of the continuing decay of the old neoliberal order, and that this is leading to the militarisation of international relations, regionalisation of the world economy, and the redundancy of…
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Changing the Regime, Building the Nation
Philip Cunliffe explains why nation-building is the solution to the impasse in Western politics identified by Perry Anderson as the Regime. In a recent essay for the London Review of Books, Perry Anderson plots out the deadlock confronting political parties of both left and right across Western states, and notes that this deadlock paralyses both…
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Death Warmed Up
Peter Ramsay argues that the British right’s proposal for a Great Repeal Act only reveals the futility of its approach to the nation. An online Anglofuturist put out a video last week weaving together the words of the Tory politician Robert Jenrick, ex-Reform MP Rupert Lowe and conservative historian David Starkey, each promoting the proposal…
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The Politics of Planning
Aaron Wells explains how Labour’s new Planning and Infrastructure Bill is unlikely to untangle the political problems in the planning process that plays such a large part in Britain’s building crisis. Housing Secretary Angela Rayner MP talks a big game about ‘taking on the blockers’ who stand in the way of development, but NIMBYism and…
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Trump’s Tool: The Limits of Bannon’s Postmodern Nationalism
In Washington, the struggle within Trump’s coalition between MAGA and Musk is picking up steam. Alex Gourevitch thinks MAGA’s fascist-saluting champion Steve Bannon is likely to be on the losing end. It has been strange watching Steve Bannon not just stalking DC but having nearly reclaimed his place on stage. Even for a culture that…
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Two Cheers for the Chagos Deal
Philip Cunliffe argues that the deal with Mauritius over the Chagos Islands is in the national interest, even if it was done for the wrong reasons. The British government has finally relinquished its sovereign claim over the Chagos Islands, Britain’s last African colony. Although an international treaty has yet to be finalised Britain has in…
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Reconstituting the Nations: Britain and Ireland after Brexit
This is the text of a talk given by Peter Ramsay to the Desmond Greaves Summer School 2024 in Dublin. He argues that the reconstitution of a sovereign nation-state in Britain depends on the achievement of Irish national sovereignty, and that the relation of the two nations exemplifies the inherent internationalism of the politics of…
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The Far-Right Excuse
Peter Ramsay argues that the official reaction to the recent riots in England is an ideological distortion that seeks to deflect responsibility for national disintegration. The riots and disorder that spread across Britain last week involved outright racial violence and intimidation, criminal damage and looting. They were widely condemned, and prosecutors are rightly taking action…
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Rule of the Void
The UK’s general election result might seem like a restoration of the old pre-2016 political order. A bland technocrat has won a sweeping majority. However, Peter Ramsay and Philip Cunliffe argue that Labour’s massive victory is hollow and leaves the state in a weaker position than ever. The election results are a dramatic manifestation of…
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Why the Nation Matters
With a General Election looming, Peter Ramsay spoke last week at the London School of Economics about why the survival of the British nation is in doubt and why the politics of culture war are an evasion of the problem rather than a solution. Here is an edited version of what he said. Benedict Anderson…
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The British Nation: What’s Its future?
Northern Star editor Peter Ramsay will be speaking about the future of the British nation together with David Edgerton, author of The Rise and Fall of the British Nation, and Tomiwa Owolade, author of This Is Not America: Why Black Lives in Britain Matter. The event is free and takes place: Thursday 2nd May 6.30pm London School of…
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Avoiding the British Question
Following the recent restoration of devolved government to Northern Ireland after two years of paralysis, Pauline Hadaway investigates the permanent crisis that is Northern Ireland’s politics, and asks why Britain is keeping the Union on life support. Over 100 years after the Unionist Party elected James Craig as Northern Ireland’s first Prime Minister, Sinn Féin’s…
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Conscription and the Void in Foreign Policy
Recent discussions in Britain over the reintroduction of conscription only expose the dangerous void between rulers and ruled, argues Lizzie Finnegan. The outgoing Chief of the General Staff, General Sir Patrick Sanders, recently stirred public controversy by proposing that the British armed forces should be significantly expanded by training and equipping a ‘citizen army’ capable…
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Burying Brexit to Save Stormont
Peter Ramsay on how Sunak’s deal with the DUP neutralises Brexit and confirms what we have previously argued on The Northern Star: that Britain’s national sovereignty needs Ireland’s reunification. Jeffrey Donaldson’s announcement that the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) will end its two-year boycott of the devolved power-sharing executive that governs Northern Ireland is bad news…
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Save Us from National Saviours
Philip Cunliffe considers the current interest in ‘Anglo-Gaullism’ among some British conservatives, and asks whether there is any prospect of a national saviour on the French model coming to the rescue of an exhausted British nation. With the nation in the grip of palpable decay, our existing political system offers no prospect of change or…
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Waving the Wrong Flags
The rancorous divisions in Britain over the war between Israel and Hamas exemplify the decadence of our national politics. Peter Ramsay argues that the claims of both sides in the dispute are toxic to the sovereignty of the British people. The sacking of Suella Braverman as Home Secretary is the culmination of an extraordinary round…
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Nation-Building
Last week Peter Ramsay and Philip Cunliffe spoke at the 2023 Battle of Ideas festival in London about the lessons of Brexit. They argued that Brexit teaches us that if we are ever to take control of our state then we need an independent politics of nation-building. Here is what they said. Peter Ramsay: I…
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