{"version":"1.0","type":"rich","provider_name":"Acast","provider_url":"https://acast.com","height":250,"width":700,"html":"<iframe src=\"https://embed.acast.com/$/9a03fe9e-1ff0-4dcc-b3f6-50bd1f016ea4/7bd11c97-54fa-4b89-a357-d8adb768791e?\" frameBorder=\"0\" width=\"700\" height=\"250\"></iframe>","title":"Britain Wrestles with its Past","thumbnail_width":200,"thumbnail_height":200,"thumbnail_url":"https://open-images.acast.com/shows/6195701f2eacc3a36070252a/619570bccb3c660012e3cf6a.jpg?height=200","description":"<p>We talk with the writer and political commentator Fintan O'Toole about how British politics can and should deal with its imperial past in the age of Brexit.&nbsp;From battles over statues to fights over nationalism we explore whether history has become the new democratic divide. Why does Churchill loom so large over our politics?&nbsp;Can Labour reclaim the mantle of patriotism?&nbsp;Will the Union survive the history wars?&nbsp;Plus we ask whether there has been a generational shift in attitudes to race and identity.&nbsp;With Helen Thompson.</p><p><br></p><p>Talking Points:&nbsp;</p><p><br></p><p>Debates over statues and monuments are really more about the present than the past.</p><ul><li>They don’t necessarily lead you to a real engagement with either your history or your contemporary identity.</li><li>Britain has a long history of questioning how the past is thought about in the public sphere.&nbsp;</li></ul><p><br></p><p>Is it possible to have a serious political argument about Churchill’s legacy anymore?</p><ul><li>In the age of Johnson, is everything a proxy?&nbsp;</li><li>Churchill can’t be separated from the Second World War in British historical memory.</li><li>The Churchill question goes deep into the Union question. If you take away the experience of the two world wars, it’s not clear what keeps the Union together.</li></ul><p><br></p><p>How do you articulate a sense of British patriotism when the state is in decline and the history it’s wrapped up in is often disgraceful?&nbsp;</p><ul><li>For example, you could celebrate Britain’s move to outlaw the slave trade—but almost every historian would point out that this is shot through with hypocrisy.</li><li>There’s a profound problem around the history of Britishness.&nbsp;</li></ul><p><br></p><p>Over the last 10 years, two different consensuses have broken down, and these interact with each other quite lethally.&nbsp;</p><ul><li>First there’s consent to Britain’s membership in the EU; this broke down more in England and in Wales.</li><li>Second is consent to the Anglo-Scottish union breaking down in Scotland.</li><li>And the fact that the referendum produced a Leave vote meant that the Northern Ireland question came back into play.</li></ul><p><br></p><p>Nationalisms always want to purify themselves into victimhood.</p><ul><li>What this does is occlude the complexity of the history of the nation itself.</li><li>Nationalism involves telling a story about the past that often, though not always, involves trying to break away from some larger political authority, often an empire.</li><li>Part of the present moment’s attitude towards British history is not new: the sense that British history was delegitimated by Empire has been there before.</li></ul><p><br></p><p>Mentioned in this Episode:&nbsp;</p><ul><li><a href=\"https://www.ft.com/content/cf8d338e-afd6-11ea-a4b6-31f1eedf762e\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">The <em>FT</em> reviews Andrew Adonis’ biography on Ernest Bevin</a></li></ul><p><br></p><p>Further Learning:&nbsp;</p><ul><li><a href=\"https://www.waterstones.com/book/heroic-failure/fintan-otoole/9781789540994\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">Fintan’s book, <em>Heroic Failure: Brexit and the Politics of Pain</em></a></li><li><a href=\"https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2019/08/15/boris-johnson-ham-of-fate/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">Fintan on Boris Johnson</a></li><li><a href=\"https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/adamserwer/why-were-finally-taking-down-confederate-flags\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">More on ‘The Lost Cause’</a></li><li><a href=\"https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2020/07/23/trump-unpresident-unredeemed-promise/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">Fintan’s recent piece on Trump in <em>the New York Review of Books</em></a></li><li><br></li></ul><p><strong>And as ever, recommended reading curated by our friends at the LRB can be found here: </strong><a href=\"http://lrb.co.uk/talking\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>lrb.co.uk/talking</strong></a></p><p><br></p><p><br></p>","author_name":"David Runciman and Catherine Carr"}