A new report has suggested that the social contract between the people and the institutions is currently “broken” and that more people are supportive of “extremist” ideas like ethnonationalism and remigration.
The research suggested that only 23 per cent of people in Britain believe the country is working as it should and that the “social contract” between rulers and ruled is intact. A significant majority (61 per cent) believe that the social contract is broken.
Those who voted Labour at the last election are least likely to believe the social contract is broken, but even so, 36 per of them do believe the system is not working.
The majority of Lib Dem, Green, Conservative and Reform UK voters believe the social contract is broken, with Reform voters the most likely to believe this, at 83 per cent.
Almost a third of people (32 per cent) said they believed capitalism had failed and the country needs a communist revolution.
When asked why the social contract is broken the most common reason given (36 per cent) was governments not delivering on their promises, although the inability of the government to protect UK borders (31 per cent) and punishingly high taxes (29 per cent) were also common reasons.
Huge immigration numbers appear to be another factor in the belief that Britain is broken. Over half (55 per cent) of people believe that national identity is disappearing because of diversity, although 45 per cent believe diversity actually strengthens national identity.
A third of people support the policy of remigration.
On Islam, the report found that while 85 per cent of Muslims say they want to integrate into British society, 42 per cent of the general population believe they are incapable of doing so.
The lead author is Dame Sara Khan, a former Counter Extremism Commissioner. She co-authored the report with Reform MP Matt Goodwin, who unsuccessfully stood to be an MP for Reform UK. The report was compiled using research from More in Common and the Hofenung Foundation.
In a summary, the report’s authors note, “Britain’s social contract is broken for a majority of citizens; distrust and disillusionment with our institutions is the norm and anxiety about national identity and diversity are now mainstream concerns.
"A collapsed cordon sanitaire which traditionally kept extremist narratives and conspiracy theories confined to the margins are now held by large minorities, and in some cases majorities, of the population.”
