display
Citizens of the USA and important European states have become much more open when it comes to defining the national identity of their respective states.
This is the result of surveys conducted by the renowned PEW Institute in the USA, France, Germany and Great Britain.
At the same time, however, there is a wide gap between political camps as to what important factors in national identity are.
The differences are particularly strong in the highly polarized USA.
As the surveys showed, Christianity no longer plays a role in the self-definition of the most populous Western countries.
In Germany, only 23 percent of citizens say that being a Christian is an important part of national identity.
Source: WORLD infographic
In traditionally secular France these values are even lower at 14 percent and also in multicultural Great Britain only at 20 percent.
Even in the USA, where more citizens define themselves as believers than in Europe, only 35 percent now consider Christianity to be an important part of national identity.
Germans do not find the place of birth so important
display
A similar picture emerges when it comes to the question of whether someone has to be born in the country in order to belong. Only 25 percent find that in Germany, 31 percent in Great Britain, 32 percent in France and 35 percent in the USA. Compared to a PEW study from 2016, the changes are particularly clear in the USA and Great Britain, where 55 and 56 percent at that time considered the question of the place of birth to be important. Donald Trump relied heavily on anti-immigration rhetoric in the 2016 election campaign, and Great Britain had a Brexit campaign behind it at the time, which was also characterized by anti-immigration motives.
However, a higher number of citizens believe that immigrants who want to belong should adapt to the customs and traditions of their new home.
That is what 62 percent of Germans, 70 percent of Americans and 71 percent in France and Great Britain think.
When it comes to defining a country's dominant culture, mastering the majority language seems to be the predominant criterion.
87 percent of the British, 93 percent of the French and 94 percent of the Germans consider this important.
Americans are a little more relaxed at 77 percent when Spanish has become an important second language in some federal states with many Hispanics.
display
In fact, in many Western countries there seems to be a growing acceptance that immigration also changes the host society. A majority believe that their countries are better off with it if they are willing to change traditions and their own way of life. The willingness to change is particularly great in Great Britain (68 percent), while the cultural inertia appears to be particularly great in France, where only 51 percent of citizens are open to change.
But: Many questions of identity are assessed very differently by the political camps.
In the left spectrum, for example, Christianity no longer seems to be a marker for the identity of our societies.
Only nine percent of the left questioned consider this important in the USA, seven percent in Germany, five in Great Britain and three in France.
The situation is similar with the question of the place of birth, which is rarely seen as a criterion for identity.
The information provided by the left fluctuates between ten percent (Germany) and five percent (USA), who see origin as an important factor.
display
Many leftists also apparently no longer see language as an important characteristic of their identity.
In the USA only around 24 percent and in Great Britain 41 percent, only in France (52 percent) and in Germany (65) a majority of the left still believe in the identity-creating effect of the national language.
On all of these issues, the gap between left and right is particularly large in the United States.
The PEW study presented astonishing results on the question of national pride.
In the United States and Britain, only 16 and 17 percent of the left are “mostly proud” of their country, compared with 55 and 58 percent of the conservatives.
Source: WORLD infographic
In Germany and France, on the other hand, both political camps are equally proud of their countries, the difference between left and right is only around five percent. In fact, Germany appears to have the most patriotic left among the nations surveyed. 46 percent of them are proud of Germany, while conservatives, 51 percent, are less proud of Germany than those in the middle of politics.
Regardless of political camps, Germans are generally more proud of their country than others.
On average, 53 percent of Germans say that, in France it is only 45 percent, in Great Britain 41 percent, and only 39 percent of Americans feel proud of their country.
However, this part of the survey was collected in autumn 2020, when America was still suffering from Trump's failed corona policy and the vaccination successes of the USA and Great Britain were not yet foreseeable this spring.
Debate about political correctness
Questions of political correctness are currently being passionately discussed in many Western countries, and here the political camps are usually wide apart.
It is astonishing, however, that there is greater unease about excessive political correctness on the left than the media discourse suggests.
Source: WORLD infographic
At least 32 percent of the left in the US think that the “political correctness culture” has gone too far and that people feel hurt too quickly by what other people say.
In Germany, 38 percent of the left see political correctness as a problem, in Great Britain 41 and in France almost half of the left questioned.
All in all, the issue of migration and fear of losing one's identity seems to have lost some of its explosive power since the height of the refugee crisis and the beginning of the Trump years. Between 2014 and 2020, for example, the number of those who believe that immigrants are ready to adapt to the majority society increased significantly. The only exception is France, where the number of those who see immigrants willing to adapt fell slightly between 2018 and 2020.