Daily Times

The 27-member EU (without Britain) is making it clear that Britain is not going to have any special deal with the EU after it has exited. There would be no concessional access to the EU’s large single market without the accepted four freedoms: that its members abide by the free movement of labour, goods, capital and services. At the same time, London’s status as the financial hub of the EU is under threat. Germany’s financial market regulator reportedly said that London could not host the headquarters of a planned European stock exchange, and could not remain a centre for trading in euros after it has left the EU. This would downgrade London’s status as a global centre in all sorts of ways — politically, economically, and strategically. The anticipated negative effects will take time to filter through but, over time, the United Kingdom will be the loser.

At home, the Brexit referendum has thrown the country’s politics into turmoil, which is seen at two levels. First: instead of clarifying the situation within the ruling Conservative Party after a fairly convincing vote to quit EU, it was thrown into chaos with the Justice Secretary Michael Gove, a close ally of the lead campaigner Boris Johnson, turning on him and declaring his own candidacy for prime minister’s job. Whoever comes on top and takes over David Cameron’s job will have a difficult task of uniting the party, not to speak of the country — nearly half of which voted to stay in the EU. While the Conservative Party is working its way through its leadership crisis, the Labour Party is in all sorts of strife with its parliamentary wing resoundingly declaring a vote of no-confidence in their leader, Jeremy Corbyn. However, Corbyn is refusing to go as he was elected by the rank and file membership of the Labour Party. He will probably have to go eventually because a Labour Party so hopelessly divided, is likely to be decimated in the next election.

Of course, the politics of the country might settle down over time, but Brexit referendum has created an overall uncertainty about the future. With Scottish voters having overwhelming voted to remain in the EU, it further complicates British polity. The Scottish First Minister met some of the EU leaders to canvass its case to remain as part of the EU. But that is not likely, as Scotland is part of the United Kingdom, and hence not able to exercise sovereign rights. Therefore, the only way for them to exercise the EU option would be to separate from the UK through another popular referendum that London might or might not allow so soon after the recent one that failed. The Brexit might also create problems with Northern Ireland, with its compatriots across the Irish border a part of the EU. The eventual solution might be a hastened union between the two parts of Ireland — north and south. In other words, it is a tangled world in the UK where its two parts, Scotland and Northern Ireland, would rather quit Britain to remain within the EU.

Another aspect of the Brexit referendum, which I have already touched briefly, is how it might impact the European Union project, which has kept the feuding and warring Europeans from lunging at each other, as in WWI and WWII. Coming in the wake of Europe’s still unresolved financial crisis — with Greece at one time in danger of either quitting or forced to exit the euro zone, and some other member countries facing their own moments of debt overload and forced into austerity regimes with mounting unemployment and social distress — Britain’s decision to quit might start a process of unravelling over a period of time. Some of the issues that propelled British referendum are a matter of concern for some of its other members as well. The issue of loss of sovereignty is a serious concern with some countries, especially smaller countries, which feel that Germany and France, particularly Germany, tend to dominate through the pan-European institutions based in Brussels. Germany’s dominance was seriously resented in Greece, and in other countries forced into austerity regimes. The anti-EU constituency, strongly associated with extreme right and ultra nationalist parties, is quite influential in France and Netherlands and becoming stronger elsewhere. In Poland and Hungry, their right-wing, if not fascist regimes, also resent the human rights elements of the EU project.

These powerful extreme nationalist forces have been strengthened further by the influx of refugees from the Middle East due to civil wars made worse by the so-called IS caliphate in parts of Iraq and Syria. Those voting for Brexit also feared, as part of their collective multiple neurosis, that Britain’s membership of the EU would make it further lose control of its national borders by letting in more refugees/immigrants into the country. Britain is suffering from an identity crisis, and has been since it lost the empire. The referendum has tended to provide an outlet to vent out all these frustrations as well as the deep divisions in British society along generation, class, regions and city versus country. The educated people with higher incomes and living in cities and university towns have voted to remain in the European Union.

The problem, therefore, is — and it is all over Europe and the west — that many people and their numbers are increasing, feel alienated with the political system that seems to ignore their concerns and cater for those who underwrite the system. The process of globalisation, these people believe, is not working for them as it has increased unemployment by exporting jobs to China and elsewhere in the developing world, and that it is only the mega rich of their world that are making a killing out of the political system at home and its global extension. Therefore, they want the centre of gravity to shift back by reclaiming national sovereignty. And Brexit is a manifestation of this. In the US, the Trump phenomenon is clearly rooted in collective neurosis of blaming everything on the “other.”

At the geopolitical level, Britain’s exit from Europe must please Russia by hopefully reducing London’s disproportionate weight in the western political and military councils. Within EU and NATO, Britain has been the most strident critic of Russian occupation of Crimea and its role in the Ukraine crisis. London espoused the most comprehensive sanctions regime against Russia linked to its policies to destabilise Ukraine. And it is also very active in the NATO military maneuvers to checkmate an anticipated threat of Russian destabilisation in the Baltic states and eastern Europe. Moscow should be pleased at Brexit for two reasons. First: as noted earlier, it will cease to be part of the European “collective” and hence not able to exercise as much influence as it did by being within the EU. Second: if British exit from the EU were to start a process of loosening/fragmenting of Europe, Russia will have greater scope to fish in the murky EU waters.

In all sorts of ways, the British referendum in favour of exiting EU is likely to set in motion centrifugal forces that will not only affect the United Kingdom and Europe but also the established global order. This would help China to further push its claim as the alternative power centre.

(Concluded)

The writer is a senior journalist and academic based in Sydney, Australia. He can be reached at sushilpseth@yahoo.com.au