Cooling Britannia: why are we losing our national pride?

Patriotic ardour fading in age of the gap year and social media instead of ration
books
By John Bingham, Social Affairs Editor
8:37PM GMT 16 Jan 2016

British national pride is quietly fading in the

age of budget air travel and social media
networks, ground-breaking new research
shows.
A younger, more internationally-minded
generation who, crucially, are more likely to
have been to university than ever before, are
only a third as likely to feel a “strong” sense of
national pride than those who grew up in the
shadow of the Second World War.
The findings emerge from a study of data from the British Social Attitudes survey, the
longest running and most authoritative barometer of public opinion of its kind. Researchers
analysed responses to questions on topics relating to patriotism and attachment to the UK
from people in mainland Britain in 2003 and 2013.
On the surface, overall levels of national pride appear to be unchanged, with the same
proportion of people (82 per cent) telling researchers they either “very proud” or
“somewhat proud” to be British in both years.
But when the figures are broken down they point to striking move away from overt patriotic
fervour.
In 2003, 43 per cent of those surveyed said they were “very proud” of their nationality, with
another 39 per cent saying they were only “somewhat” proud.
But 10 years later, in response to the same question, the figures were more than reversed
with only 35 per cent expressing strong pride in being British and 47 per cent saying they
were “somewhat proud”.
Overall the proportion expressing strong national pride fell by almost a third.
The responses to related questions - on whether people felt “close” to Britain and whether
they would rather be a citizen of the UK than any other country - showed a similar pattern.
Britons emerge as more strongly patriotic than the French or Germans but less so than the
Spanish, Swiss or Japanese and significantly less so than the Americans.
Out of a sample of 33 countries, by far the strongest feelings of national pride could be
found in a handful of emerging developing powers: South Africa, India and especially the
Philippines.
“Britons come out as middling compared with the rest of the world and, although most of
us do feel proud, we are far less likely to express this view strongly than many other
countries,” said Ian Simpson, Senior Researcher at NatCen Social Research, which
carried out the analysis, which as originally commissioned by Tetley Tea as part of market
research.
“There is perhaps something quite British in being reticent about overt flag waving
patriotism.”
But within the country the figures point to a subtle generational shift.
Although most younger Britons are proud of their nationality, they are dramatically less
likely than their grandparents to admit to a strong national attachment.
In 2013 only 20 per cent of those in their 20s surveyed saying they felt “very proud” of their
country, compared with 66 per cent of over 75s.
One possibility, the report suggests, is that people’s patriotic ardour grows with age. But it
points out that, were this the only explanation, strong national pride would be growing
rather than declining because of the ageing population.
Significantly, the gap in national pride between generations has also widened in the past
10 years. Older Britons were twice as likely to express strong national pride at the
beginning of the new century, now they are three times as likely.
Almost a third (32 per cent) of those aged between 18 and 29 voiced “strong” pride in
2003, but a decade later the proportion was only 20 per cent.
Crucially, the study notes a link between university education and lower levels of patriotic
feeling.
Only one on five graduates said they felt “very proud” to be British compared with 59 per
cent those with no formal qualifications.
Strikingly, only half (51 per cent) of graduates said they would rather be citizens of Britain
than any other country, compared with eight out of 10 of those with no qualifications.
“While today’s young people remain at least ‘somewhat’ proud of being British, this
suggests that they feel less strongly about this and about Britain in general than did
previous generations,” said Mr Simpson.
“Only time will tell whether their feelings towards Britain will remain the same or will grow
stronger as they get older.
“However, these findings do suggest that part of the reason for declining pride over time is
that older generations – with higher levels of pride – are being replaced by younger
cohorts who are less inclined to feel ‘very proud’ to be British.
“If this trend continues then we would expect to see pride in British identity continuing to
decline at a gentle but significant level.”
He said that it was possible that stronger national feelings in older generations had been
forged in tougher times.
“Perhaps their sense of ‘Britishness’ links back to memories of the war or post-war years,
when national pride might have been boosted by the shared experience of adversity,” he
said.
“Younger people’s views of the world are shaped by different experiences, including the
wider availability of budget travel and, perhaps as a result, a greater exposure to other
countries and cultures from a younger age.
“Younger generations’ understanding of what it means to express ‘national pride’ may
also, perhaps, have been influenced by more recent expressions of this, such as the
British National Party, which may for some have more negative connotations than the
‘nationalism’ of the post-war years.”
Prof John Curtice, one of the UK’s leading experts on public opinion, said: “I think there
are two things about younger people today, the first is that more of them than in any
previous generation are exposed to a university education.
“Universities themselves are quite international, they constantly have that international
perspective in many respects and also just encourage people to be a little bit critical about
the world.
“I would say universities are an environment in which people probably are not encouraged
go be feeling very strongly about anything and certainly not feeling uncritical about their
country.
“The second thing obviously is that today’s younger generation expect to be able to go to
Barcelona or Berlin or Warsaw and most have experience of doing that.
“They are living in a world in which information and communication is global: once upon a
time you might have had a pen pal in Spain, now you can talk to them on Skype, if you can
get over the language barrier - it creates a more cosmopolitan perspective.”
But he added: “We shouldn’t go too far – one of the lessons of post-1989 Europe is that
globalisation and the fall of the iron curtain didn’t mean that nationalism disappeared,
definitely not.
“Buy maybe somewhere like Britain you might end up with a population who say ‘my
country’ but not ‘my country over anything’.”
He said that it was questionable whether Britain had ever been a “great flag waving
country” but that events like the 2012 Olympic Games and Diamond Jubilee demonstrated
the potential appeal of British symbols.
Yet the fact that the research was carried out in 2013, just a year later, showed that the
patriotic “glow” had not been a permanent fixture.
He added that last year’s Scottish independence referendum had also altered perspectives
towards Britishness north of the border but not in the way many might expect.
Although the vote demonstrated a surge in support for nationalism, attitude surveys since
had also shown that people in Scotland were more likely to identify themselves as “British”
instead of or in addition to Scottish.