Re: CHAT: national identity

In message <373CABAD.C3AB3CF@...>, Tom Wier
<artabanos@...> writes
>Boudewijn Rempt wrote:
>
>> In the Netherlands (and as far as I know in the rest of the European
>> Union),
>
>This is somewhat of an aside, but I've noticed that several of y'all seem
>to refer to yourselves as members of the European Union, rather than
>constituent members of your own countries.  Does this reflect a general
>attitude at present in Europe that people there are more and more first
>Europeans, and then only later French or Dutch or Germans, much as most
>Americans, as opposed to 100 or 150 years ago, now consider themselves
>first Americans, and then only later members of a particular state?
This is what you might call a live issue.  I think that the number of
people who think of themselves as primarily Europeans, or citizens of
the EU, and only secondarily Dutch, German, French, British etc is still
fairly small, but growing.  The question of what the EU will become is
not decided; whether it will become a federation, a United States, say,
or stay much in its present state, or become something entirely new.

Still, I have my passport here; it's an odd combination, which reflects
the above, I guess.  It's a reddy-brown colour, like all EU passports;
on the cover it says "European Union - United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Northern Ireland - Passport", then it has the British Royal coat-of-
arms.  Page 2 says the same things, but in the twelve official languages
of the EU: English, Spanish, Danish, German, Greek, French, Irish,
Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, Finnish and Swedish.  But on page 1 it has
in copperplate print the traditional imperially-arrogant rubric of a
British Passport: "Her Britannic Majesty's Secretary of State requests
and requires in the Name of Her Majesty all those whom it may concern to
allow the bearer to pass freely without let or hindrance, and to afford
the bearer such assistance and protection as shall be necessary."  So a
US immigration official, say, is supposed to read that and allow me to
pass for fear of Robin Cook's wrath?  Heh.

The UK is possibly less European in feeling than most of the other
countries, and this is politically a very hot issue here.  What's more
we are going through a somewhat complex process with the whole notion of
"British" at the moment, with the majority of Scottish people, for
example, saying that they consider themselves Scottish first, and
British second; with quite a few saying they don't feel British at all.

In general the whole idea of the nation-state in Europe is developing
at present and no-one knows quite in what direction.  After all, there
are about a dozen new nation states here which didn't even exist ten
years ago, and as everyone knows their births haven't all been easy.

--
John Fisher   john@drummond.demon.co.uk   johnf@epcc.ed.ac.uk