[1][2] The ideas of Little Englandism first began to gain popularity in the late 18th century after the loss of the American colonies, but later came to be strongly associated as a reference to members of the Liberal Party who opposed further expansion of the British Empire.
[4] Since the 2010s, especially after the 2016 Brexit referendum,[5] the term has become a popular derogatory epithet for an English chauvinist[2] who mistrusts the European Union, international cooperation, and foreigners in general.
[clarification needed] The English manufacturers resented paying taxes to defend a colony that imported few British goods, but exported so many to England.
[8] The Little England stance was adopted by a wing of the Liberal Party typified by William Gladstone (1809–1898), who opposed many of Britain's military ventures in the late 19th century.
Arthur Ponsonby wrote of the Liberal leader Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's opposition to the Boer War: "The impression one got of him from the Press in those days was … that he was an unpatriotic Little Englander".