He sovereign individual: how to survive and thrive during the collapse of the welfare state. it1/29/2024 Some of its citizens believe themselves to be British, while others say they are not British at all others say they are British and another nationality-Scottish or Welsh, say. With the passing of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia, it is now one of the rare states in the Western world whose name is not simply the nation it represents: The United Kingdom is more than Britain and the British. “Britain,” here, is shorthand for the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland-a collection of nations and territories, combining England, Scotland, Wales, and the disputed land of Northern Ireland-while also being a legitimate, sovereign, and unitary nation-state itself. The problem is that Britain is not a traditional country like France, Germany, or even the United States. Put simply, no other major power is quite as conflicted about whether it is even a nation to begin with, let alone what it takes to act like one. At the heart of Britain’s crisis is a crisis of identity. The 20 years from 2000 to 2020 might have been objectively awful for Britain, but the country has been through other grim periods in its recent past and not seen its coherence come quite as close to breakdown as it is today. Right: Two visitors wait to be admitted at the entrance of Downing Street. Left: A raven sits on a colonnade outside Westminster.
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