ABSTRACT

In November 1969, a quite odd and ludicrous case of alleged discrimination was blown out of all proportion, perhaps wilfully, by Conservative politicians and the media in Britain, some eighteen months after Enoch Powell’s Birmingham speech. A quite high-profile issue at the time, the case has now been completely forgotten. Yet, Esteves’s article suggests that the event itself is helpful to make better sense of the British—rather than merely English—ramifications of debates on race relations and discrimination, particularly at a time of an upsurge in Scottish nationalism. More importantly, the case partakes of what Esteves calls the ‘white backlash archive’, a populist and popular repertoire that nativists—not only in Britain—draw from in order to underline that the state is inefficient and counter-productive when it tries to legislate against discrimination, as well as that ethnic minorities and immigrants get undue protection from the state authorities, even though the 1969 case itself had nothing to do with ethnic minorities or immigration.

摘要

1969 年 11 月，在伊诺克·鲍威尔 (Enoch Powell) 发表伯明翰演讲约 18 个月后，英国的保守党政客和媒体甚至故意夸大了一起涉嫌歧视的非常奇怪和可笑的案例。这个案子在当时是一个相当高调的话题，现在已经完全被遗忘了。然而，Esteves 的文章表明，该事件本身有助于更好地了解英国人——而不仅仅是英语——关于种族关系和歧视的辩论的后果，特别是在苏格兰民族主义高涨的时候。更重要的是，此案涉及埃斯特维斯所说的“白人强烈反对档案”，这是一种民粹主义和流行的曲目，本土主义者——不仅在英国——借鉴了这一点，以强调国家在试图立法时效率低下且适得其反反对歧视，以及少数民族和移民得到国家当局的不当保护，尽管 1969 年的案件本身与少数民族或移民无关。