Blogs
Civil war
in the UK: nightmare or far-right fantasy
DATE
22 Apr
2026
AUTHORS
THEME
Jonathan
Portes reflects on the language used in political discourse following a debate
he partook in to debunk the notion that the UK could be heading towards a civil
war.
https://ukandeu.ac.uk/civil-war-in-the-uk-nightmare-or-far-right-fantasy/
Is civil
war coming to the UK? My King’s College London colleague David Betz has suggested
that it might. In a recent debate at the Oxford Literary Festival, I set out
why this claim is not only unconvincing, but potentially harmful.
There is
no credible evidence that the UK is anywhere close to civil war, defined
in the political science literature as sustained, organised violence between a
state and non-state actors. Could it happen? Nothing is impossible, but
Professor Betz’s estimate
of a ‘18.5% chance over five years’ is the sort of speculative extrapolation of
invented numbers that brings serious quantitative social science into
disrepute.
More
broadly, the UK remains a stable, high-income democracy, with functioning
institutions, competitive elections and peaceful transfers of power.
Comparative research shows that civil wars are strongly associated with
weak state capacity and low levels of democratic accountability, rather than
with established democracies like the UK. While trust in institutions has
declined, this is neither new nor unique to the UK – and long-term data from the British
Social Attitudes Survey shows it remains far from collapse. Protest is not
insurgency, and polarisation is not civil war.
Professor
Betz’s thesis became even more absurd when he tried to explain to a bemused
audience the “sides” in this civil war, which will apparently be a three-way
contest between the non-white population and their allies in the metropolitan
elite, the “white British” outside the cities, and the remains of the state. My
family, like millions of others, contains representatives of all three
factions. While of course there are occasional tensions, I find it difficult to
picture us “drilling out each others’ kneecaps” in Professor Betz’s lurid
language.
More
broadly, the idea that the UK is dividing into coherent blocs along racial or
geographic lines does not withstand scrutiny. Social and political identities
in the UK are overlapping and complex. Most families and communities span
multiple such categories. This is not a society organising itself for violent
internal conflict. Indeed, where civil wars do emerge, the actors and cleavages
are typically visible well in advance, with organised groups, territorial
control and escalating violence. There is no evidence of
such dynamics in the UK,
The more
relevant question is why this language is being used at all. References to
‘civil war’ are no longer confined to fringe spaces; they increasingly appear
in parts of mainstream
commentary. But this is not a neutral description of political conditions.
It is a framing – one that shapes how those conditions are understood.
That
framing matters. Language influences how people interpret politics. Repeated
claims that institutions are illegitimate, that democratic outcomes cannot be
trusted, or that the state no longer represents “people like you” do not simply
reflect dissatisfaction. They help construct a narrative in which democratic
processes are seen as fundamentally compromised. The claim
by Reform that they lost the recent Gorton and Denham byelection because of
“foreign” voters is just one example. A substantial body of research suggests
that democratic institutions reduce the likelihood of political violence by
providing channels for the peaceful resolution of differences. Framing politics
in terms of impending civil war implies that these mechanisms have already
failed.
This
rhetoric is also rarely confined to abstract concerns about governance. It is
frequently tied to arguments about identity – about who belongs, and who does
not. Claims of crisis are often linked to the idea that “ordinary” Britons are
under threat, whether from immigration, from ethnic or religious minorities, or
from broader social and cultural change. The structure of the argument is
familiar: an “us” that is being displaced, and a “them” that is being
privileged.
There is
nothing new about this as a political strategy. What is different is the
escalation in language. Talking about “civil war” suggests that social and
cultural divisions are not only a matter of concern but fundamental – and
potentially irreconcilable except through violence.
This has
several consequences.
First, it
makes serious policy debate more difficult. Take immigration. It is entirely
legitimate to disagree about its economic and social impacts, or about the
appropriate policy response. But if immigration is framed primarily as a threat
to national or ethnic survival, those debates become harder to conduct in a
meaningful way.
Second,
it risks weakening social cohesion. Democratic politics depends on a basic
level of mutual recognition: that even where we disagree, we accept one another
as legitimate participants in a shared political community. Evidence from UK-focused research highlights both the
extent of perceived polarisation and the risks of misperceiving divisions.
Third,
while the UK is not remotely close to civil war, such rhetoric may have effects
at the margins. A small number of individuals may take it literally, or use it
to justify confrontational or even violent behaviour. Studies of political
violence in democratic contexts suggest that inflammatory narratives can play a
role in legitimising such actions.
None of
this is to suggest that the UK does not face serious economic and social
challenges. Weak productivity growth, pressure on public services, regional
inequalities and political dysfunction are all real issues. Analysing these
problems – and proposing workable solutions – should be the focus of serious
debate.
Framing
the situation as one of impending civil war does the opposite. It distracts
from underlying issues, while contributing to a more polarised and less
constructive political environment.
So the
answer to the original question is straightforward. No, the UK is not heading
towards civil war. But the increasing use of that language is not a harmless
exaggeration. It reflects – and reinforces – a way of thinking about politics
that is more polarised, more exclusionary, and ultimately less helpful for
understanding the challenges the UK actually faces.
By
Professor Jonathan Portes, Professor of Economics and Public Policy,
Department of Political Economy, King’s College London.
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