The rise of national populism across the West – most prominently expressed in England by Reform UK and its predecessors, the UK Independence Party and the Brexit Party – poses a distinct challenge to prevailing models of integration and cohesion. Central to the party’s appeal is its ability to mobilise White working-class voters. While public discourses of multiculturalism rarely refer to the White working class, they may contribute to their alienation by thinking of the ‘majority’ as an inherently privileged group and so not addressing the experiences of the White working class. This neglect can and should be remedied. This article argues that their marginalisation reflects broader limitations within traditional frameworks that conceptualise ‘majority’ and ‘minority’ in rigid terms. Drawing on the evolving demographic and cultural landscape of 21st-century England, we explore the potential of multicultural nationalism to offer a more inclusive account of national identity that recognises both majority and minority cultures and incorporates the White working class as a meaningful part of a diverse nation. While recognising the critiques and political misuse of the term ‘White working class’, we contend that the White working class remains a socially significant group. We conclude that multicultural nationalism offers a cohesive and egalitarian foundation for shared belonging in England and Britain more widely and that it can afford the White working class a genuine political voice or agency that is lacking in the symbolic rhetoric of national populism.
Hill et al. (Wed,) studied this question.