Britain's national identity faces profound challenges as the nation's social fabric becomes increasingly stratified, according to journalist Symeon Brown. His new book, 'The Good, the Black and the Boujee,' reveals how class divisions within Black Britain are reshaping the country's political and cultural landscape, raising critical questions about national cohesion.
Brown argues that Britain’s changing face is most visible in politics. He notes that the black population has never held more cultural stature and economic capital across politics, music, film, and publishing. Yet, these same years saw Black Lives Matter protests and the toppling of Edward Colston’s statue, alongside claims that success is harder than ever for black people.
This tension arises because class has been largely absent from discussions about race, Brown states. He found black people in Britain are “hyper-visible, but also, in many cases, disenfranchised.” To understand this, Brown interviewed approximately 1,500 members of Britain’s black middle class, exploring their education, employment, families, aspirations, spending, social values, and class.
His findings indicate that to be black in Britain often means being assumed to be working class. This assumption, Brown suggests, has masked the reality that black Britons closest to power are disproportionately middle class. Some questions, like why middle-class black Britons tend to date white people, felt taboo within the community, he says.
Shifting National Identity
Not everyone welcomed Brown's inquiry. He reports that “Bona fide black elites don’t like the idea of this book,” with some individuals ceasing communication once they understood his work. These objections stemmed from a belief that being black and middle class does not equate to the privilege of being white and middle class, a point Brown acknowledges while insisting on the need for interrogation.
Britain, Brown observes, is obsessed with discussing class but allergic to admitting its own issues with it. He notes the rarity of hearing someone say, “I’m black and middle class,” in Britain, with many interview requests met with denials of middle-class status. This highlights a deep-seated discomfort with internal class distinctions within the national discourse.
Brown points to Britain’s first black leader of a major political party, a black chancellor, and a foreign secretary as evidence of political change. However, he argues this representation has brought remarkably little benefit, as these individuals ultimately represent their class interests. He cites figures like David Lammy, Kwasi Kwarteng, and Miatta Fahnbulleh, noting their elite educational backgrounds, including selective schools, Eton, and Oxbridge.
Indeed, Brown states that black politicians often require more elite credentials than their white counterparts. Among the black professionals he surveyed, almost one in four had attended a fee-paying school at some point, with 72% of their fees paid directly by parents. This reveals a distinct, privileged segment within the broader population, whose experiences may diverge significantly from the wider national experience.
The Cost of Stratification
Brown contends that black Britain has become co-opted by corporate and individualist ideals, a shift from the radicalism of the 1990s, which was shaped by anti-apartheid movements and criticism of corporate behaviour. He suggests that many conversations supposedly about race are, in fact, about class, citing debates about “proximity to whiteness.”
On dating, Brown found that class often takes precedence over race. He notes that black women are more likely to be middle-class professionals than black men, with many women expressing difficulty in finding partners who match their professional and class achievements. Such internal social fragmentation further complicates the notion of a unified national community.
Brown himself grew up in social housing, with his parents being second-generation British-Jamaicans, his father a “career criminal,” and his mother a childcare worker. Despite now operating in a decidedly middle-class milieu, he describes himself as “multi-class,” believing he will “never really be read as middle class, because of my accent and other things.” This personal account underscores the persistent markers of difference within the nation.
Cambridge sociologist Ali Meghji identifies three forms of black middle-class identity in Britain, one of which involves deliberately steering cultural life towards black diasporic culture. Brown and many of his subjects fit this third category, engaging in a “middle-class cultural life driven by black cultural products.” This trend suggests a growing cultural divergence rather than assimilation into a singular national culture.
Brown emphasizes that this flourishing professional culture is only one part of the story. He warns that despite a greater cohort of black people with significant cultural or economic capital, a “huge working class” remains “disenfranchised from citizenship,” citing unresolved Windrush cases. This failure to ensure full citizenship for all residents erodes public trust and national cohesion.
Furthermore, Brown argues that discussions about the white working class often flatten reality, overlooking that black and other minority-ethnic working-class people face similar pressures, often compounded by racial discrimination. He cautions that such labelling can transform shared material problems into a racial contest, pitting struggling groups against each other rather than fostering common national interests.
Crucially, the economic foundations of middle-classness are eroding for everyone, regardless of race, after three decades of wage stagnation and rising costs. Brown concludes that to be middle class today means being “poorer, less influential, and doing work of lesser stature than 30 years ago.” This broader economic decline impacts the native working and middle class, highlighting that while internal identity debates intensify, the fundamental economic stability of the nation is weakening for all its citizens. The book is published by Dialogue at £25.00.