브렉시트 이후 다민족국가로서의 영국의 지속가능성

A Study on the Sustainability of the UK as a Multi-National State: Focusing on British ‘National Identity’ and ‘State Identity’

This paper aims to achieve two main goals. One is to explore how residents in four major regions of the UK perceive their identities and what characteristics they have in the light of both their national identity and State identity. The other is to look into Britain’s sustainability as a multi-national state in the post-Brexit era from the same perspective. The main results of this study are as follows. First, while those who found their identity in national identity rather than State identity have decreased, those with British identity have mostly increased since 1999. Second, even though internal split among the British revealed in their attitudes and behaviors about several issues surrounding Brexit, there were much more positive empirical evidences than negative ones for Britain’s sustainability in the post-Brexit era. Third, it was the possession of British citizenship, and respect for their institutions and legal systems rather than such factors as religion or sharing of tradition that the British had emphasized as indicators of British identity. This phenomenon implies that British identity has gradually evolved into a rational way emphasizing civic traits in line with social change in the UK. Fourth, the British need to make sure that their State identity functions as a strong basis for cohesion supporting sustainability as a multi-national state, coexisting with national identities in four regions. However, at the same time, they should caution themselves against transforming that into a kind of exclusive and egoistic nationalism.