The process of creating a national identity consisting of 'British' values has two creative elements which result in a work of fiction.
The first is the construction of a set of values that all members of the 'nation' are taken to share such that they have a crucial sameness, setting aside the fact they do not all share these values.
The second is the claim that national ‘others’ cannot share those values because they are different, again setting aside the fact that these values are widespread beyond the national border.
Just as members of the nation create a fictional account of themselves, they create a fictional account of others – it is, importantly, a process of exclusion of the other who does not share 'our' values despite the fact that they do share them and that many members of our 'nation' do not.
And we can also see that the members do not only create a fictional account of the past, they also create a fictional account of the present.
The fabrication is of the presence or absence of others in the national history and the national here-and-now.
