Contested Britain is a distinctive analysis of how the politics of the UK and the lives of British citizens have been reframed in the first decades of the twenty-first century. Bringing together researchers in the social sciences from the UK and Europe, this book goes beyond traditional approaches to provide a truly interdisciplinary account of Britain today. Its central focus is on the relationship between austerity, Brexit, and the rise of populist politics. The book seeks to explore and understand the Brexit vote, not only in its own right but also as an expression of wider political shifts in the UK, in particular around the experience of and responses to austerity. In doing this it shows how politics in Britain has become increasingly contested with profound difference of geography, generation, gender, race and class, as well as the emergence of a range of practices, institutions, and politics that challenge the hegemony of austerity.