What the lies of Nationalism can reveal

Andrea Jenkyns, a Conservative pro-Brexit MP issued the following tweet on the 12th August 2018.

Though easy to dismiss as Nationalist ranting, this tweet says a lot about the Brexiteer mindset, the ideological war being waged in Britain at this time and the inherently conflictual and anti-democratic nature of Nationalism.

In the first instance, the use of the phrase 'liberal elite' to denote opponents is key. The initial tweet implies that all political opponents of Brexit can be marked as a 'liberal elite'. Jenkyns walks this back slightly in the replies by saying that it only applies to those who 'sneer and act superior' but these are such subjective qualities that the caveat is completely meaningless. This tactic, describing your political opponents as an 'elite', is typical of populism. By creating a category of the 'elite' for your opponents, you line yourself up on the side of 'the People'. These two groups are framed as being in a permanent fight, with the victory of one being the loss of the other. Society then cannot be a harmonious union between different groups of differing views - the 'elite' must be defeated for 'the People' to prosper.

Framing your opponents as the 'elite' is, therefore, a way of delegitimising them and their political views. Note that it bears no relation whatsoever to actual socio-economic status. Jenkyns here is an MP for the governing party. Likewise, you will find CEOs or actual Lords condemn the 'liberal elite'. Even assuming Jenkyns' marker for 'liberal elite' (those who sneer and act superior) has any worth in practice, it could still be used to apply to a working class person working 40 hours a week on a minimum wage job. And why would it apply to them? Because they hold the wrong political view.

What Jenkyns is doing by using this kind of language is pre-emptively smearing all those who hold an opposing view to hers on the question of UK membership of the EU. She frames them as 'elites' regardless of their actual position in society, using this language to make their arguments invalid by attacking them as people rather than attacking their arguments.

This is followed by an affirmation of the numbers of people who voted for Brexit. This is a common line among Brexiteers, yet it should not be treated as a unique innovation. The tactic of Nationalists using democracy to infiltrate into mainstream society is as old as Nationalism itself.

In reality, the number of votes is not that strong an argument. When examined dispassionately, the referendum was a close result - 51.9% to 48.1%. The Leave side won more votes but not so many more as to be an irresistible or uncontestable force. The idea of it being the biggest vote in UK history is not all that impressive when one considers the inevitability of such an outcome in a country with a growing population. Indeed the way they insist on highlighting how many votes they won serves to demonstrate two key weaknesses. Firstly their insecurity in relation to their victory, trying to brush away the close nature of the result by focussing on pro-Leave vote numbers alone. Secondly, it exposes that their commitment to democracy is incredibly weak, being only focused on the electoral aspect of democratic society. This is what is known as 'electoralism' - the presence of relatively free and fair elections or referendums but the absence of other important aspects of democracy such as the rule of law or the separation of powers. Brexiteers unintentionally reveal that they have little commitment to democracy as a whole, only to the voting aspect. This must be recognised as the threat that it is. Electoralism is a cloak for authoritarian rule, a tool often used by populists and Nationalists in the destruction of democracy. The malleable nature of leading Brexiteers' attachment to real democratic processes should not be taken lightly.

The next aspect to consider is the idea that people have been 'sneered at'. Here, having delegitimised the 'elites' (her political opponents), Jenkyns swiftly moves to the other typical populist tactic of glorifying her own side. By giving them a status of victimhood, Jenkyns frames Brexit supporters as having a right to be resentful, even vindictive, towards the 'elites' who have wronged them. This is again a narrative of intractable conflict between 'elites' and 'the People'. Again, it is not possible to build a healthy democratic society that allows for differences of opinion when you frame one side as being an enemy. We have moved on from those in favour of the EU being simply 'elites', they have now also become cruel in some capacity. They should not merely be ignored or proven wrong, they should be treated with enmity as a response to how they have treated 'the People'.

Finally, Jenkyns goes on to say that she loves her country and believes in 'Global Britain'. In the same way as framing her opponents as 'elites' is used to deligitimise valid political disagreement, so too is the statement that she loves her country. The implication in the context is that her opponents do not, that they do not truly care about the future of this country. One could even consider them to be traitors. The language use is not accidental. It is detrimental to democracy in the UK and toxic to open and free debate. This is the standard approach of populist Nationalism. By affirming that your opponents do not love their country, you are aiming to convince your supporters that those people do not have a right to hold a view on the future of the country. These 'elites' do not care about this country like 'the People' do, therefore they should not be allowed to make the decisions - that is the argument being deployed, a tactic actively aiming to exclude a large section of the population from the democratic process by branding them as a kind of traitor to the nation.

The ending on 'Global Britain' is a clever illusion. An entirely artificial concept whose worth has not been demonstrated in any practical sense, the idea of 'Global Britain' has nothing to do with trade policy. Instead, it is a useful defence to roll out whenever Brexiteers engage in this kind of Nationalist rhetoric. They believe that by stating their commitment to 'Global Britain', they can get away with their anti-democratic, Nationalist attacks and easily deflects any accusations that they may be insular or xenophobic. It is, of course, meaningless and a weak defence as the idea itself has no real policy implications attached. There is no plan to liberalise migration rules and the only major change is expected to be the end of EU Freedom of Movement, meaning a net result of Britain significantly shutting out migrants. While on the trade side there is no evidence to suggest that the UK will gain a large number of new trade deals. At the moment we're working hard to simply roll over the deals we have as part of the EU and it will be considered a good outcome if we're even able to stand still at the end of the Brexit transition period, let alone make any gains.

Through the lies, this rhetoric is revealing. The ideological battle being waged right now is not about liberation or prosperity or democracy, it is about Nationalism. UK democracy is being consistently undermined from the inside-out by powerful politicians and media personalities seeking to attack any peaceful disagreement as illegitimate at best, treasonous at worst. They are framing all their opponents as uncaring, unfeeling 'elites' in a bid to ensure that the debate becomes so toxic that people will genuinely fear to question the Brexit project. They are ruling out any cooperative vision for all the people of Britain, instead declaring that one side must be stopped in order for 'the People' to triumph. This is Nationalism. It is dangerous to our society, it is dangerous to our democracy and it cannot live peacefully in this or any country. What will it take before our political representatives take stock of the dangerous path this country is heading towards and take action to avert disaster?