Rules, rituals and symbols are an integral part of politics. Taking an empirical and interpretative approach, they are explored within a particular place – the British upper chamber of parliament – and time : 1998-2004. Within the House of Lords they are significant in that, (a) rules governing behaviour socialise new peers with remarkable efficiency, (b) peers’ symbolic capital compensates for the limits to their political power, (c) ritualised debates mobilise consent to the dominance of the executive but also allow expression of substantive ideological divisions in parliament and in wider society. The ideological assumptions of many leads them to regard ritual as trivial and backward-looking, but this chapter illustrates how « far from being window dressing on the reality that is the nation, symbolism is the stuff of which nations are made ».