The emergence of the British National Party (BNP), primarily at the local level, has led to a proliferation of political, media and academic accounts seeking to explain its rise. These accounts have focused on a homogeneous, fixed construction of ‘the white working class’. This article, written during early 2010, seeks to challenge these assumptions by offering a more nuanced account of the nature of BNP support. It will be suggested that the data available on BNP supporters demonstrates that a focus on such simplistic conceptions of the ‘white working class’, ignores the heterogeneity that exists within this group, while simultaneously downplaying how BNP voters construct boundaries, drawing on both ‘racial’ and class distinctions. The article then draws on qualitative interviews conducted with BNP voters in Burnley between 2004 and 2005, exploring how notions of entitlement rest on particular, differentiated claims to whiteness — claims mediated by class and articulated through assertions of ‘respectability’ and ‘responsibility’.
Anthias F. ( 2005) Social stratification and social inequality: Models of intersectionality and identity. In: Devine F, Savage M, Scott J, and Crompton R (eds) Rethinking Class: Culture, Identities and Lifestyle. Basingstoke : Palgrave, 24-45.
2.
Bottero W. ( 2005) Stratification: Social Division and Inequality. London: Routledge.
3.
Bottero W. ( 2009) Class in the 21st century. In: Sveinsson KP (ed.) Who Cares About the White Working Class?London: Runnymede Trust, 7-15.
4.
Bowyer B. ( 2008) Local context and extreme right support in England: The British National Party in the 2002 and 2003 local elections. Electoral Studies27: 611-20.
5.
Burnley Borough Council (2008) Burnley Snapshot: Facts and Figures Update - 2008. Burnley : Burnley Borough Council.
6.
Byrne B. ( 2006) White Lives: The Interplay of ‘Race’, Class and Gender in Everyday Life. London: Routledge.
7.
Clarke S., Garner S. and Gilmour R. ( 2009) Imagining the ‘other’/figuring encounter: White English middle-class and working-class identifications. In: Wetherell M (ed.) Identity in the 21st Century: New Trends in Changing Times. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 139-56.
8.
Clayton J. ( 2008) Everyday geographies of marginality and encounter in the multicultural city. In: Dwyer C and Bressey C (eds) New Geographies of Race and Racism. Aldershot: Ashgate, 255-68.
9.
Collett M. ( 2005) Reforming the benefit system. Identity April: 14-15.
10.
Copsey N. ( 2004) Contemporary British Fascism: The British National Party and the Quest for Legitimacy. Basingstoke: Palgrave.
11.
Cruddas J., John P., Margetts H., Lowles N. and Rowland D. ( 2005) The Far Right in London: A Challenge for Local Democracy?York: Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust.
12.
Denham J. ( 2009) Connecting communities Speech given at the Institute for Community Cohesion (ICC). , 14 October. Available at: http://www.communities.gov.uk/speeches/corporate/connectingcommunities
13.
Eatwell R. ( 2006) Community cohesion and cumulative extremism in contemporary Britain. Political Quarterly77(2): 204-16.
14.
Ford R. and Goodwin MJ(2010) Angry white men: Individual and contextual predictors of support for the British National Party. Political Studies58(1): 1-25.
15.
Garner S. ( 2007) Whiteness: An Introduction. London : Routledge.
16.
Goodwin MJ ( 2008) Backlash in the ’hood: Determinants of support for the British National Party (BNP) at the local level. Journal of Contemporary European Studies16(3): 347-61.
17.
Goodwin M. and Ford R. ( 2009) Yes, the BNP could win in Europe. The Guardian, 13 February. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/feb/12/bnp-far-right-eu
18.
Hari J. ( 2008) BNP votes are a cry of white working-class anguish. The Independent, 5 May.
19.
Hartigan J. ( 2005) Odd Tribes: Towards a Cultural Analysis of White People . London: Duke University Press .
20.
Haylett C. ( 2001) Illegitimate subjects? Abject whites, neoliberal modernisation, and middle class multiculturalism. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space19: 351-70.
21.
Hewitt R. ( 2005) White Backlash and the Politics of Multiculturalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
22.
Husbands CT ( 1983) Racial Exclusionism and the City: The Urban Support of the National Front. London: Routledge .
23.
John P., Margetts H., Rowland D. and Weir S. ( 2006) The BNP: The Roots of its Appeal. Essex: Democratic Audit.
24.
Kefalas M. ( 2003) Working-class Heroes: Protecting Home, Community and Nation in a Chicago Neighbourhood. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
25.
Kite M. ( 2006) White voters are deserting us for the BNP, says minister . Sunday Telegraph, 16 April.
26.
Lamont M. ( 2000) The Dignity of Working Men: Morality and the Boundaries of Race, Class and Immigration. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
27.
Linehan TP ( 2005) Whatever happened to the Labour Movement? Proletarians and the far right in contemporary Britain. In: Copsey N and Renton D (eds) British Fascism, the Labour Movement and the State. Basingstoke : Palgrave, 160-81.
28.
Meikle J. and Cobain I. ( 2008) Rise of BNP is politicians’ fault - Blears. The Guardian, 22 November.
29.
Nayak A. ( 2006) Displaced masculinities: Chavs, youth, and class in the post-industrial city. Sociology40(5): 813-31.
30.
Rhodes J.(2009) The political breakthrough of the BNP: The case of Burnley. British Politics4(1): 22-46.
31.
Rhodes J.(2010) White backlash, unfairness and justifications of British National Party (BNP) support. Ethnicities10(1): 77-99.
32.
Savage M. ( 2000) Class Analysis and Social Transformation. Buckingham: Open University Press.
33.
Sayer A. ( 2005) The Moral Significance of Class. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press.
34.
Skeggs B. ( 1997) Formations of Class and Gender: Becoming Respectable. London: Sage.
35.
Skeggs B. ( 2004) Class, Self, Culture. London: Routledge.
36.
Watt P. ( 2006) Respectability, roughness and ‘race’: Neighbourhood place images and the making of working-class social distinctions in London . International Journal of Urban and Regional Research30(4): 776-97.
37.
Webster C. ( 2008) Marginalized white ethnicity, race and crime. Theoretical Criminology12(3): 293-312.
38.
Wray M. ( 2006) Not Quite White: White Trash and the Boundaries of Whiteness . Durham, NC: Duke University Press .
