Brexit and Empire: ‘Global Britain’ and the Myth of Imperial Nostalgia

Euroscepticism, Anti‐Nostalgic Nostalgia and the Past Perfect Post‐Brexit Future

“…While some define empire nostalgia as a desire to reclaim a 'buccaneering' heyday, distinct from Powell's criticism of Britain's imperial 'folly' and account of England's longer exceptional history (see Kenny and Pearce, 2018), others view contemporary Powellite discourse on immigration and race as inevitably linked with Britain's imperial exploits (El-Enany, 2020). Still others remain sceptical of the 'myth' of empire nostalgia (Saunders, 2020).…”

“…Of these criticisms, the recognition of empire nostalgia's role in left-wing pro-European advocacy makes a particularly important contribution, highlighting the imperial and colonial resonances of decades-long 'Remainer' arguments about Britain's natural place leading Europe and representing the Commonwealth in EU institutions (Saunders, 2020). This insight also illuminates the peculiar nostalgic meta-politics of Brexit scholarship, underscoring how pro-Remain authors frequently dismiss the nostalgic proclivities of positions that correspond to their personal politics, while tarnishing pro-Brexit rivals with nostalgia's unsavoury undertones (Saunders, 2020). Although such discrediting tactics are a common feature of broader political discourse (Kenny, 2017), as my analysis below attests, binaries of nostalgic 'backward-looking conservatism', associated with the Eurosceptic Right, and anti-nostalgic 'forward-looking progressivism', attributed to the pro-European Left, are flawed (Robinson, 2012, p. 19).…”

“…In Eurosceptic discourse, these complex temporalities appear notably in the subtle invocation of Britain's imperial and colonial history, often linked to the viability of cooperation with an alternative political collective known as the Anglosphere. For some scholars the diluted quality and forward‐looking veneer of such imaginaries has been taken as evidence of empire nostalgia's absence (Saunders, 2020; Wellings, 2017). However, in this article I interrogate the emotional appeal of Eurosceptic Anglospherist discourses for their invocation of a past perfect future that remains implicitly rooted in imperial and colonial forms of nostalgia.…”

Ruling Divisions: The Politics of Brexit

“…Specifically, as Stephen Wall argues, memories of a particular aspect of Britain's history, its imperial past, "have exerted a powerful influence on Britain's European debate" (Saunders 2020). In his letter declaring his intention to campaign for "Leave," Boris Johnson conjured up the British Empire: "We used to run the biggest empire the world has ever seen, and with a much smaller domestic population and a relatively tiny civil service.…”

From Gagarin to Sputnik: the role of nostalgia in Russian public diplomacy

“…By summoning a nation’s past to the present, the past becomes a template that illuminates the present and elucidates the future (Miskimmon et al 2014 ). For instance, British officials have equated Brexit with the British Empire’s ‘last stand’ during WWII in which an independent UK charted its own destiny (Saunders 2020 ).…”