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A Transition to Strategic Irrelevance?

The result of last week’s UK referendum on whether to remain in the European Union (EU) has produced shock-waves around the world and has raised all kinds of questions about the country the UK will now become. The narrative promoted by those politicians in favour of a “leave” vote – the Brexiteers – was of a confident outward-facing UK which, freed from the dead hand of a sclerotic and inward-looking Brussels, would optimize its considerable potential as a global trading nation. The arguments of the “remain” camp about the dangers and uncertainties of leaving the EU were dismissed as “project fear.” Yet a breakdown of voting patterns shows that the key driver for those voting to leave the EU – predominantly old, white, and working class – was precisely fear: fear of globalization and immigration, the response to which has been a narrow tribalism totally at odds with the narrative of the Brexiteers.

The other key driver to the vote to leave the EU was a wave of anti-establishment sentiment that has gripped the UK and the western world more generally. The leave vote was an inchoate protest against a political elite that was seen to be out of touch with its electoral base. Indeed, one of the biggest surprises of the outcome was the degree to which the Labour Party (which supported “remain”) lost support in what had previously been its heartland. Within the EU, the UK economy has prospered. But as part of a long process of de-industrialisation and globalization, many secure and well-paid working class jobs have been replaced by jobs offering lower wages and less security. Except for the top one percent of earners, incomes have remained flat for many years.

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