British politics is back in the limelight, after a brief hiatus of relative sanity. The current election campaign will divert attention onto the main parties and key personalities. However, this shouldn’t mask important challenges to the very integrity of the United Kingdom that have occurred since David Cameron took the keys to 10 Downing Street in 2010.
In fact, the United Kingdom has been through a rough trot in the past fourteen years. The independence referendum in Scotland, the different outcomes of the Brexit referendum in England and Wales when compared to Scotland and Northern Ireland, and the contrasting approaches to containing the Covid-19 pandemic coming from London, Edinburgh, and Cardiff all highlighted the pluri-national nature of the United Kingdom in a way that was often masked by habitual invocations of Britain and Britishness. During the past decade, it could not be taken for granted that the United Kingdom would survive in its current form.
Fractured Union: Politics, sovereignty and the fight to save the United Kingdom by Michael Kenny
Hurst, £20 hb, 336 pp
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