A Review of British Culture - Is Britain starting to think a bit like the French?

This is a bit of a left-field blog for me but I hope you all find it as stimulating and thought provoking as usual.  At a minimum It contains plenty of good material to discuss at a dinner party, preferably over a good glass of wine.

During the current horrific Syrian crisis there was a moment where a Russian official allegedly referred to Britain as a “small island that nobody takes any notice of...”   Ouch!  Of course, David Cameron rose to the defense of Britain and mounted a robust rebuttal pointing out the history and contribution of Britain to science, art and civilisation and making the point that Britain is actually a collection of Islands.  So there.  This in turn set the press off interviewing the public, ex-pats and visitors alike hoping to find a suitably slanderous or amusing quote on the state of Britain.  However, what I found particularly notable throughout all of this was the understated, but underlying feeling permeating the coverage that maybe, just maybe the Russian had a point and maybe, just maybe we Brits actually believe him.

Now clearly we are not an entirely insignificant group of Islands but on the other hand we no longer stand in governance over a globe spanning empire.  Our international clout is in decline.  Now whilst this is not a new revelation as this has been the case for decades, what is new is the way that the country seems to be responding to the obvious reality.  For years we have managed to comfort ourselves with the idea of a special relationship with the US and to wrap ourselves up in the joy of reminiscence of empire and world wars and whilst these generations have been alive and present we seem to have been happy to live in a relatively inconsequential delusion that Britain is a very important country.  Now, with the war generations departed I think we are actually, finally, tacitly beginning to properly reassess our global position and face up to what we already knew but didn’t like admitting, that we are no longer a very important country.   So what are the signs that this is happening and what will the consequence be for Britain?   The signs are subtle and the consequences are a bit unsettling, you see I think we are becoming a bit French in our thinking, let me explain.

Earlier this summer I sat down one barmy evening with my French colleagues in a beautiful chateau to drink a lovely French wine whilst consuming an excellent local cheese, to unwind and talk nonsense.  As the wine flowed our conversation turned to our thoughts on our respective national characteristics and what it means to be French or British.  What emerged was fascinating.  Now for many years the French have known that whilst being an important country they haven’t been a massively important country, as a result they have done a tremendous job of becoming very French.  As my colleagues described it to me, “It’s almost as if what it means to be French is constantly being distilled and concentrated.  Our pride in our wines, our foods, our films, our music, our language and our culture is strong and those aspects are well preserved and strongly defended by laws and regulations.  However, this protection comes at a price as our National Identity is almost at the point of becoming pickled, of becoming completely stuck in the past and very difficult to change.”   Wow.  At this point the neural connections started firing in my brain as my thoughts turned to British culture.   Is British culture in the process of becoming distilled?  Are we on the road to permanently fixing what it means to be British?  And is this a good thing or a bad thing? 

Let’s take those big questions one at a time.  Is British culture in the process of becoming distilled?  My view is yes – I think I can see the early signs.  Britain has recently rediscovered the Union Jack, has started earnestly discussing immigration in mainstream politics, has a growing level of nostalgia in relation to classic British brands, has a renewed patriotism and love of the Royal Family and has an overwhelming desire to stick the word Brit in front of any number of nouns (Brit Awards, Brit Pop, Brit Art etc).  We also have the prospect of the Scots declaring UDI on the United Kingdom which further brings the notion of Britishness to the fore.   We are still a lot further back from being as distilled as the French but the clamour to define what it means to be British is stronger than I can ever remember in my lifetime and I do think that yes we are about to start the distillation process.  The next step will be to start having guidelines that describe exactly what it is that constitutes the Classic British Breakfast and to start ingraining classic victorian teaching methods into our education system.  I’m only half joking.

Now for the second question, are we on the road to permanently fixing what it means to be British?  Well, if we are on the path of distillation the answer must be a yes.   We are probably moving closer to being able to define the essence of what it means to be British.  Once we have defined Britishness we will start building laws and cultural norms to protect it and preserve it.

Final question then, is this distillation process a good or a bad thing?  It depends.  As a progressive thinker who is proud of the fact that the favourite food in the UK is famously Chicken Tikka Massalla (an outcome that could never occur in France) I’m not sure I like the idea.  I’m pretty sure the citizens of the world’s rapidly expanding economies are not sitting around contemplating what it means to be Chinese, Indian, Brazilian or Indonesian.   I like the idea of living in an ever changing, generous, progressive melting pot.  I’m not sure I want to be part of a country that has to summon up immense reserves of energy to change itself because of the inbuilt constraints.   On the other hand I recognise that this process of distillation is almost an inevitability and many people will be delighted about the idea of defining and protecting what it means to be British and take great comfort at being able to protect and cherish the concept of Britishness.  So my plea to the nation will be to not become so “British” that we forget that at the heart of the concept of Britishness (my interpretation) is the ability to boldly step out across the globe and embrace change.  I kind of like that.