Brexit

This page contains commentary relating to the UK EU membership referendum of the 23rd June 2016, where ‘Brexit’ (the option to leave the EU) won 52% of the vote.

Democracy vs Sovereignty? Reflections on the Brexit Debate

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27323547984_9ef3a4456a_bIn today’s post Prof. Jonathan Davies argues that the left has no option but to support the triggering of article 50, because the arguments employed against doing so are not credible and cannot presently command any sort of democratic mandate.  The left should instead harness the ‘boomerang effect’ of anti-Trump sentiment in order to build an alternative politics fighting for substantive equality, defending the free movement of labour and opposing the Thatcherite economics of the “single market”.

As Theresa May’s March deadline for triggering Article 50 approaches (this is the EU clause setting Brexit in train), “Remain” forces have been arguing that MPs should vote against it.  They effectively want Parliament to stop the Brexit bandwagon in its tracks. And, when Article 50 is triggered they believe the UK must remain part of the EU “single market”.  I voted “Remain” in the June 2016 referendum. I did so not because I like the EU but because I feared the racist backlash, which followed.  Had I voted “Leave”, I would have had to take my share of the political responsibility for that. Moreover, I share the fears and anxieties among pro-EU friends and colleagues about the rise of racism and nationalism in the UK, the US and parts of Europe. Undoubtedly, these are frightening times. Nevertheless, I believe that Remain perspectives are reckless, if not downright dangerous.  And there are far better political options.

A colleague recently made a memorable comment that attacking institutions on entirely legitimate grounds may have dire consequences, if the assailants cannot control what happens next. Remainers used arguments like this before the Referendum. The one about letting the racist genie out of the bottle convinced me.  Yet those now arguing that Article 50 must not be triggered seem to have forgotten their own rules.

After the Referendum, the pro-EU camp disinterred the constitutional principle of Parliamentary Sovereignty.  This principle holds that no authority can countermand the will of Parliament. The Supreme Court judgment on 24th January 2017 upheld that principle in forcing the government, against its will, to hold a House of Commons vote on whether it should be permitted to trigger Article 50.  MPs in the main English parties are divided, but it appears that with Labour support the government will win the final trigger vote on 8th February.  Jeremy Corbyn’s “three line whip” ordering his MPs to vote for Article 50 has led to a renewed chorus of condemnation for the beleaguered leader, not least from the left remain camp, which wants Labour to follow the principle of Parliamentary Sovereignty and strike down the referendum to save Britain from self-inflicted economic and political catastrophe.  This position is justified by the assertion of expert privilege in combination with consequentialist logics. The rationale is that even if striking down the referendum is undemocratic (a moot point) it is justified because it will prevent disaster.  So obsessed with stopping Brexit are some left-leaning academics that they have abandoned Labour and joined the Liberal Democrats.

I believe there is a lot wrong with this thinking.  As a socialist, I have never been much of an enthusiast for either Parliamentary Sovereignty, or referenda – I would prefer to extend and deepen participatory forms of democracy in all walks of life.  The politics of the referendum campaign were dreadful.  The Remain side ran a dismally uninspiring pro-business campaign.  The Leave campaigns were much worse, replete with lies about NHS funding and naked racism. Yet, both Labour and the Tories committed to abide by the result long before the Referendum was held.  And, at present, there seems to be very little public appetite for reversing it. If anything, the contrary is true. Arguably, then, if Parliament refused to trigger Article 50, it would be striking down the referendum in the face not only of the result itself but widespread and enduring public opposition. In these circumstances, the justification for stopping Brexit would seemingly boil down to the claim that “we know better than you”.

There is nothing wrong with expertise.  We need it very badly if we are to flourish as a species.  The racist right has cynically exploited growing public skepticism about expertise, but skepticism itself is far from unreasonable.  For example, the field of economics not only failed to predict the 2008 crisis it refused to acknowledge even the possibility that such an event might happen. It colluded in making the crisis by aligning itself, conspicuously and unapologetically, with neoliberal ideology. Economics departments in leading universities have long since been cleansed of anti-neoliberal (heterodox) economists. Where real scientific expertise depends on openness, plurality, modesty and healthy skepticism, economics relied on institutional power, arrogance, dogma and intellectual closure.  Of course, not all economists are guilty of this kind of behavior – far from it.  Nevertheless, it is untenable to think that invoking economic expertise will work as a justification for striking down the referendum.

At the same time, the UK is going through a growing crisis of democratic representation, a condition Colin Crouch calls “post-democracy”.  The institutions of the state, repeatedly exposed as seedy and corrupt, are held in diminishing public esteem. If, in some ideal world, it could be argued that the British State works for the rights and freedoms of all, the majority might just be convinced to put our collective sovereignty in the hands of an institution like Parliament. But today, our decaying institutions could not possibly carry the people without naked political repression. Presently, there is no justification for demanding that MPs overturn Brexit. On the contrary: it would not be democratic and alternative appeals to sovereignty, backed by claims to expert knowledge, are not politically credible.

For these reasons, it is now the turn of Remain supporters to heed warnings about unleashing forces they cannot possibly control.  Striking down the referendum would be politically catastrophic, not least in triggering a further racist backlash. Three line whip or not, Jeremy Corbyn’s position on Article 50 is correct in my opinion. And, it provides some basis for opposing a reactionary Brexit thereafter.

The other Remain demand is that once Article 50 is triggered, the UK should try to stay within the EU “single market”.  This is generally what people mean by a “Soft Brexit”. The PM has ruled this out, because it would mean having to accept “free movement” of EU citizens.  Mrs May therefore proposes a nationalist and anti-immigration “Hard Brexit”.  I deplore that and seek to defend the principles of “free movement” for people and the right of refugees to sanctuary in the UK.  Is the “single market” really the way to do that?  Some time before the EU was founded, the right wing Mont Pèlerin Society envisioned a single market. These founding fathers of neoliberalism later influenced Margaret Thatcher, who celebrated Britain’s accession to the single market:

“It’s your job, the job of business, to gear yourselves up to take the opportunities which a single market of nearly 320 million people will offer. Just think for a moment what a prospect that is. A single market without barriers—visible or invisible—giving you direct and unhindered access to the purchasing power of over 300 million of the world’s wealthiest and most prosperous people …

As Mrs Thatcher recognized, the EU single market promotes free market capitalism, competition and corporate profitability. No-one on the left thought it was a good idea in 1988. It certainly isn’t now.  The single market and other pro-market institutions are antithetical to equality, solidarity and democracy. Even the IMF now concedes that “instead of delivering growth, some neoliberal policies have increased inequality, in turn jeopardizing durable expansion”.  Markets – single or otherwise – polarize. And they crash. To regain our credibility, the left must surely fight for more worthwhile and tangible goals. If so, the real challenge is to both defend free movement and fight for an entirely different economics rooted in socioeconomic equality and solidarity.

The inspirational global response to Donald Trump’s racist edicts shows that this combination of demands is entirely pragmatic. Protests against Trump’s impending visit to the UK could be among the biggest ever held in this country. The Stand up to Racism demonstration on 18th March will also be very big.  Defending migrants and refugees will be among the key demands.  Most importantly, it is possible even now to see how the wave of giant protests across the UK and US can incubate an entirely different politics of hope and solidarity. The boomerang effect of anti-Trump protests in the UK is already plain to see, as Mrs May’s humiliating encounter at the White House exposes the absurdity of racist claims about reclaiming UK sovereignty.  Barricading ourselves behind discredited political and economic institutions is wrong and it will not work.

Jonathan Davies is Professor of Critical Policy Studies and Director of the Centre for Urban Research on Austerity at De Montfort University.

Post-Brexit Devolution: What Should it Look Like?

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brexitIn this post Paul O’Brien argues that after Brexit devolution should  empower local government to deliver a localised industrial strategy.

Councils could be forgiven for wondering if Government remains as committed to devolution and decentralisation of power, post Brexit, as it appeared to be before June’s vote.

What started well and seemed to have support at the highest level of Government, with George Osborne’s zealot like enthusiasm, doesn’t appear to have the same prominence with new cabinet figures, indeed some fear that the agenda could simply fizzle out.

It would be a major policy U-turn to cancel next year’s mayoral elections for the big three combined authority areas of Greater Manchester, Liverpool City Region and the West Midlands, however it doesn’t appear that many other deals are close to completion with almost daily stories of negotiations collapsing.

Whilst some find the idea of having an elected mayor forced upon them objectionable, others have concerns over whether you are really going to get what you signed up for in terms of funding for projects or powers, given the economic uncertainty that exists post Brexit.

Given the financial crisis local services face, decentralisation is exactly what is needed. It’s clear the public feel that they are not getting their fair share of resources. APSE’s recent opinion poll, with Survation, found 77% of the public want more of their taxes spent locally, rather than elsewhere.

There now appears to be a consensus amongst Government that the UK needs a new industrial strategy with national infrastructure projects at the heart of it. However, what is really needed is for local government to be recognised as the key to driving a localised industrial strategy, and given the powers and funding to deliver it. One that can draw in investment and stimulate local growth, which will have an immediate impact now, rather than in fifteen years time.

Devolution to date has been about individual authorities combining and going to Government asking for funding to undertake initiatives that are ‘unique’ to their area but in reality when you examine many of the Combined Authority Orders there are common themes running throughout. So is it really necessary to painstakingly go through the process of putting these together and then spend months negotiating back and forth with civil servants on the detail? Is it not time for the sector to get together, as a whole, and ask Government for a devolution package around local industrial strategies, including borrowing powers for housing, transport and roads infrastructure, employability and skills development?

In the current climate of uncertainty we may just find a Government that is willing to listen to creative solutions to problems, which they are struggling to find answers for.

Paul O’Brien is Chief Executive of APSE (the Association for Public Service Excellence) and a member of the Centre for Urban Research on Austerity

Restricting immigration won’t pay for working people

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In today’s blog, guest bloggers from the New Economics Foundation (NEF) – Olivier Vardakoulias (Economist) and Marc Stears (CEO) – argue that restricting immigration  will not benefit workers in areas that voted in favour of Brexit. This post was originally published on NEF’s website – see here.

If we have learnt anything so far from party conference season, it is that free movement from the European Union has fewer and fewer supporters in mainstream politics.

When it comes to immigration, Brexit is becoming hard Brexit before our eyes.Politicians of all sides appear to believe the communities that voted to Leave the EU have legitimate concerns about immigration’s impact on their living standards.Immigration restrictions, it is suggested, will benefit working people, especially by significantly increasing their pay.

But this is not true. An increase in immigration restrictions would, in fact, do very little to benefit workers in these communities.

If you look at data from the counties of the UK, you see that there is no correlation between increases in immigration and decreases in real wages of less skilled occupations. And there’s no correlation either between increases in immigration and local unemployment rates.

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Source: CEP election analysis

In fact, we might go even further. Restrictions on free movement may actually reduce wages and workers’ standards.

Because we know from history that immigration doesn’t stop when it becomes harder. Just look at Mexico and the United States. If more EU nationals enter the UK undocumented, they will be working outside official channels, labour laws and the official minimum wage.

And workers who are granted a visa by their employer (the current process for migrants from outside the EU) will be at the mercy of that employer.

Companies will have the power to hire and fire migrants and withdraw their working permit at will, leaving migrant workers with an even weaker bargaining power over their wages and working conditions.

So ending free movement may in reality put domestic workers in a more unfavourable situation than they are in now.

Restricting immigration from the EU is a false panacea for communities who have struggled over the last decades.

Politicians of all parties would do well to avoid selling this snake oil of a solution to the working people of Britain.

Devolution after Brexit: 3 things that need to change

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In this post, originally published on the New Economics Foundation’s blog, Adrian Bua argues that devolution should deliver a genuinely more equal, decentralised and balanced political economy in the UK following the Brexit vote.

Brexit has cast doubt over much of UK economic policy – including the Treasury’s pledged support for a ‘devolution revolution’.

Many areas that voted in favour of Brexit were those left behind by a decline in British industry since the late 1970s and those suffering the most from government spending cuts.

They’re the areas that need effective devolution the most, but they’re also the areas standing to lose the most from a Brexit.

Uncertainty has already hit the manufacturing sector with Siemensdeciding to halt investment in Hull, and it won’t be the last case of its kind. Decisions like this will affect poorer regions disproportionately as their industry is generally more dependent on EU demand.

Moreover, these regions have also benefitted the most from EU regional development funding – and therefore stand to lose the most as these funds are discontinued, especially if the British state decides not to compensate the losses.

All this means that poorer regions will suffer from short term disruption and uncertainty, but it does not mean that such regions won’t benefit from Brexit in the long term. For example, supporters of Brexit such as James Wharton, the Minister for local growth and the Northern Powerhouse, say northern businesses now have a huge opportunity to “go global”.

We are concerned however, that rather than leading to a more balanced economy, Brexit risks turning Britain into a full-on ‘hedge-fund economy’ that works for already global finance firms and the City of London.

It’s therefore even more important that the government changes its currently-flawed approach to devolution in the following ways:

1. An industrial strategy for the whole of the UK

The Brexit vote was a loud complaint by those left behind by what Colin Hay has called the ‘Anglo-Liberal’ growth model based on London’s financial services, spending fuelled by private credit and housing price bubbles. This also brought with it the decimation of our public and social services.

We need a new industrial strategy and a plan for regeneration that will boost the incomes and opportunities of these alienated communities that have been left behind.

2. More power to the people

The above, which would include some redistribution of wealth, needs to be accompanied by the redistribution of power.

As Tony Hockley argues, more money and investment can’t reverse the cultural elements of inequality, highlighted brilliantly by Lisa McKenzie’s work on the stigmatisation of working class neighbourhoods in Nottingham, for example.

To tackle this appropriately, as well as offering opportunities for excluded communities to benefit from growth, we need to enable such communities to take an active role in our society and economy. Approaches to ‘Community Economic Development’ such as that being carried out in Preston in their experiment with co-operative industry, have much potential in this respect.

By combining economic development, with the empowerment of citizens, communities can become ‘development makers’, rather than ‘development takers’.

Devolved areas should also engage citizens in forms of participatory public administration, by implementing meaningful and genuine forms co-production in public services, and developing more ambitious approaches to participatory budgeting to give genuine control to people over public investment in their areas.

3. More democratic politics

Our politics also needs to be more responsive to people and the decentralisation of political power needs to occur in political parties and through the electoral system.

Decay in these key democratic institutions is part of what Colin Crouch terms ‘post-democracy’, a condition which I argue elsewhere underpinned many of the pathologies surrounding the EU referendum.

All political parties need a bottom up reinvention based on greater democracy.

How do we do this?

Current attempts by the Labour party to rediscover its roots in social movements are welcome, as are remarks by incoming Prime Minister and Conservative leader Theresa May about a country that works for everyone.

A more proportional electoral system that allowed for a greater plurality of political parties, that could experiment with different organisational models and offer a greater variety of policy platforms without engaging in distracting internal struggles would also be welcome.

Adrian Bua is researcher at the New Economics Foundation and at the Centre for Urban Research on Austerity

The EU Referendum and the ailings of contemporary democracy

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In this post Adrian Bua argues that Brexit highlights fundamental failures in contemporary British democracy.

Democracy was a key element of the debate around whether the UK should exit or remain in the EU. One of the main criticisms of the EU from both right and left is the distant and unaccountable nature of its institutions. And now, calls for the referendum to be repeated by those shocked by the actual and potential future consequences of ‘Brexit’ are increasingly popular. This move is condemned by Brexiteers as an affront to democracy. On the face of it, they make a valid point. The referendum result gave a clear, if narrow, mandate to leave. Ignoring it would further underline the reality of a pro-EU elite that has lost touch with those ‘ordinary people’ that politicians such as Farage argue have been oppressed by migration.

However, contemporary democratic theory places serious doubts on plebiscitary forms of decision making. In deliberative models it is not only the process of aggregating votes that matters, but also the processes of opinion formation preceding the vote. Leaving aside the widely debated, complex and unresolved issue of whether, and when, direct democratic processes are appropriate to make complex decisions – the phenomenon of the EU referendum highlighted clear deficits and inconsistencies in our representative democracy. In characteristically opportunistic fashion, David Cameron called a referendum to avoid a Tory split that could have been fatal for his 2015 election ambitions.  Martin Lodge and Will Jennings argue that this reflects a broader phenomenon whereby referenda are used not to advance democracy but for political leaders to control divisions in their own parties.

These inconsistencies reflect deep rooted problems in our political system. During the post-war consensus, the institutional landscape of British democracy was enriched by collective mass-membership organisations that had close relationships with political parties and kept them grounded in people’s lives. However, the current turmoil is arguably symptomatic of what Colin Crouch termed the UK’s condition of ‘post-democracy’.  The institutions of the social democratic consensus remain, but have been hollowed out by the de-politicising consequences of neo-liberalism and the dominance of politics by privileged individuals and big business. For citizens, elections have become a spectator sport, managed by experts and reported on by private media monopolies. The rise of single-issue politics has been a salutary development, but in no way has it matched the capacity for the institutions of collective action that heralded the social democratic era to channel demands into the political system.

I would argue that the vote in favour of Brexit is a symptom of Britain’s ‘post-democratic’ condition. It is no secret that it is the constituency that suffered the most from the economic re-structuring over the past few decades that favoured ‘Brexit’. The faith that neoliberal policy makers had for entrepreneurial private sector activity to replace the gutting on manufacturing and heavy industry never materialised in peripheral regions. Instead, what Colin Hay has termed an “anglo-liberal growth model” emerged – based on a service industry concentrated in London and consumption fuelled by private credit and a housing boom in the South East. Gordon Brown’s infamous declaration that boom and bust had been abolished revealed the institutionalisation what Colin Crouch termed an “unacknowledged policy regime”. The election-winning machine that was New Labour contributed to the post-democratic condition. Its obsession with “scientific” approaches to evidence based policy making cohered with Fukuyama’s “end of history” thesis – politics becomes a managerial and technical endeavour. Citizen participation becomes limited to focus group and survey research designed to optimise the party’s chances to reflect public opinion and thus win elections. Importantly, this left behind the concerns of those working class constituencies that “have nowhere else to go”, as New Labour architect Peter Mandelson put it.

But the chickens have come home to roost. The financial crash, and ensuing recession, deepened the economic woes of peripheral regions. Public sector employment and redistribution from the proceeds of the economy in the South East reduced through austerity. This was compounded by the deepening of the, already established, ‘beggar thy neighbour’ politics that generated contempt for a dependency culture. The Brexit campaign deepened a discourse which was already well developed and increasingly propagated by corporate media empires, that blamed immigrants for economic woes – as well as a lack of ‘control’ over our borders and burdensome EU regulation. At the time of writing, the Labour Party which had given hope to so many people that this situation might change with the election of Jeremy Corbyn, is ripping itself apart with internal struggles between its left and right. It is unclear what the outcome will be, that is a debate for another day, but – regardless of whether Brexit materialises – it will certainly be of great importance in the struggle to shape a fairer, more inclusive and democratic Britain. Should the right win, we can expect even more tea mugs and headstones promising to control immigration than in the campaign ran by Ed Milliband.

Inside and outside the Labour Party, the left should counter this discourse by finding improved ways of communicating the message that the difficulties faced by many supporters of Brexit are not due to immigration, EU regulation of lax border controls, but by a deliberate, and by no means irreversible, re-shaping of the UK political economy since the late 1970’s.  An integral part of this is to articulate a left politics based on democratic participation, empowerment and investment in social services. As Adam Przeworski pithily stated “to discuss democracy without considering the economy in which that democracy must operate is an endeavour worthy of an ostrich”. The left needs to develop a coherent and convincing vision for an alternative political economy that delivers genuine equality of opportunity, and meaningfully redistributes wealth and power. In this vein, Jonathan Davies has called for the UK and European nations to develop a “Marshall Plan for the 21st Century”. It is imperative to put flesh on the bones of this idea, and organise for its fulfilment. Social democracy should end its flirtation with neo-liberalism and regain the necessary confidence to regenerate itself on its own grounds. There is a rich legacy of thinking on participatory forms of socialism to draw on here. EU elites seem keen to make an example of Britain through a painful divorce, and the disposition of the likely UK post-Brexit leadership will be to turn the UK (or what remains of it) into some sort of libertarian utopia and international tax haven – “a free-wheeling island nation” as put by one article outlining a terrifying blueprint for a post Brexit Britain. This “scorched earth plan” is the way we are currently headed, and it is not pretty.

Dr Adrian Bua researches for the Centre for Urban Research on Austerity and the New Economics Foundation.

A European in Leicester: a poem on Brexit

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In this post Hulya Oztel shares a poem she wrote after the Brexit vote, capturing how she feels as a French citizen working and living in the UK.

Channel

I did not know I cared for the Channel that much,
I did not know I cared at all.
I now realise she was sheltering me.

Britain thinks she has left Europe
United she has – with the worst of the continent.

The gangrene has spread,
Spilling out of foul mouths – aloud.

The gangrene has spread,
Its stench pushing us apart.

The gangrene has spread,
polluting our children’s future

Hulya’s feelings mirror those expressed by P.J. Harvey in her song “England” (listen here). They reflect the sadness that stems from the rise of the far right – in France over the last 20 years, and now in the UK.

Hulya Oztel is Principal Lecturer at the Leicester Business School in De Montfort University

Two-tier Europe: the UK and associate membership

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Carol Weaver argues that Brexit should lead to a redesign of EU membership, leading to the formalisation of a ‘two-tier Europe’ composed of full members and ‘associate members’ that agree to the same rules.

Václav Havel once talked of the ‘power of the powerless’ and whilst that may well have been a very good thing with regard to the Velvet Revolution unfortunately it does not seem to have been a very good thing last week in the EU referendum here in the UK.

I’ve always told UKIP (in debates with them) that they can never have an ‘independent UK of Great Britain and Northern Ireland’. In attempting to achieve this they would inevitably destroy the very union they say they want to protect. I also told Nick Clegg some years back that he was wrong in supporting an in-out referendum with the hope the people would vote to stay.

But we are where we are so why not make the most of it. The EU has become problematic and we have discussed and debated ‘widening v deepening’, ‘two-tier Europe’, ‘multi-speed Europe’ and ‘variable geometry’ for many years now. What we have accidentally achieved, in the usual EU way of compromise, is some kind of mélange of all of these.

Now it might be time to deliberately redesign Europe with a choice of:

  1. ‘Full membership’ including Schengen and a Eurozone with deepening and more fiscal unity
  2. ‘Associate membership’ with all associates agreeing to the same rules rather than having, for example, a ‘Norway model’, a ‘Swiss model’ and a possible ‘British model’. This should not be so attractive that Eurozone countries would want to join.
  3. No membership at all.

The associate membership would not be ‘all but institutions’. It would mean limited membership of appropriate institutions with no say in the core workings of the Eurozone and possibly limited freedom of movement without full citizenship. It would apply to countries such as the UK and others that do not want to join the euro. It could also apply to countries such as Turkey once it has completed all relevant chapters. Widening of full membership is currently not feasible.

Former MEP Andrew Duff, a lifelong committed federalist and EU constitution supporter, realised this was necessary in 2013, saying ‘So the Convention in 2015 needs to craft something other than privileged partnership outside the Union, something more than the EEA, yet something less than full membership. The European Union has proved itself over the years capable of great constitutional ingenuity, and it is reasonable to assume that, given the political will to work together for the good of all Europe, it can continue to do so.’

David Cameron has in the past discussed this idea with other EU members .

The new design would mean a new treaty which could trigger more referendums including here in the UK where we have a ‘referendum lock’. This might be better than in-out referendums across Europe backed by right wing parties such as the Front National often themselves backed by Russian money.

At the time of writing Article 50 has not been invoked. There is time to consider the possibility of a new treaty outlining formal Associate Membership. It will take some time but so would any other option.

Dr Carol Weaver is Lecturer in International Relations at De Montfort University.

Brexit: the Need for a “21st Century Marshall Plan”

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2000px-marshall_plan-svgProfessor Jonathan Davies argues for a new “Marshall Plan” to fix the broken political economy of the UK, and of Europe.

There are long decades when history barely moves.  And there are times when decades or even centuries fly by in weeks.  Political history in the UK is suddenly moving at breakneck speed.  Our relationship with the EU is sundered, the UK itself fractured along a bewildering tangle of lines.  The possibility of Scottish secession looms once more.  Friends are at each other’s throats.  Terrified remain supporters – and a good few remorseful leave supporters – call for the government to set aside or ignore the referendum.  The Parliamentary Labour Party has turned all its fire on Jeremy Corbyn, while the Liberal Democrats court redemption by making a play for enraged middle class progressives.  The Conservative Party is in turmoil as is the repentant architect of Brexit, Boris Johnson.

In this febrile atmosphere, the battered, embittered and disenfranchised working classes forming the backbone of Brexit has been chosen as the chief villain of the piece – although almost half of them did not vote at all.  Stuck between the rock of racism and the hard place of “progressive” middle class contempt there is, as always, nothing on the table for them.  We must be clear that the grind, hectoring, dispossession and punishment of austerity and several decades of neoliberalism before that lie at the root of these fractures, themselves symptoms of the long durée of economic decline.  The exuberant junketing of our elites cannot disguise the feebleness of British economic growth, the illusion of shared prosperity sustained through astronomical levels of personal and private debt. The costs of this model have been imposed – quite ruthlessly – on those least able to bear them.  The realities of UK PLC for millions of people are, structural unemployment, zero hours contracts, sweat-shop labour, benefit cuts and sanctions and food banks. Brexit is the blowback.  Even so, conditions are far worse in Greece and Spain.

If Britain and Europe’s elites were serious about keeping the ship afloat, they would recognise the appalling vista they have created, abandon neoliberal ideology and austerity wholesale and embark on a massive programme of redistribution and investment in working class towns and cities. Britain and Europe would move to initiate a 21st century Marshall Plan – the post-war reconstruction programme led by the USA after WW2.  We live in very rich societies, but with ever-greater concentrations of wealth and poverty.  The very existence of the United Kingdom and European Union could now depend on the political will to reverse that trend.  Enormous ideological and political resources have been expended on neoliberalism, and such a step looks vanishingly unlikely.  It is much more likely that the reverse will happen and an even heavier price will be exacted from the working class.  Moreover, it is a moot point whether such a programme would be enough reverse the decline of late Western capitalism.  Either way, Britain and Europe can certainly afford it.  If they want the genie back in its bottle, they will have to pay the price.

Jonathan Davies is Professor of Critical Policy Studies and Director of the Centre for Urban Research on Austerity at De Montfort University

Brexit – A Nation Divided

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CURAs Jonathan Payne reflects on Brexit its causes and its consequences for UK progressives

The people of Britain woke up this morning to a Brexit vote and a country deeply divided and ill at ease with itself and its place in the world.  Democracy, the will of the people, had spoken, but no one was quite sure what the consequences would be.

Cameron’s decision to put the question of Britain’s membership of the EU to the people was less about democracy, however, and more about appeasing the right-wing Euro-sceptic elements within his own party, that have been festering for decades, and heading-off splits in the Conservative vote from UKIP. The people, albeit by a slender majority, have now given their decision, rejecting the views of the  ‘experts’, such as the OECD and IMF, who said this would be bad for the economy and jobs. It was Michael Gove who said, ‘People in this country have had enough of experts’, and it would seem, on that score at least, he was more than half right. Like so much of politics, this has been about feeling and sentiment as much as facts and argument.

There is no doubt that some in the Leave campaign, with immigration its strongest suit, played on many people’s fears and anxieties. Right-wing populism thrives by blaming the ‘outsider’ for problems, the roots of which lie elsewhere: in the lack of investment in housing and public services wrought by austerity and in a neo-liberal growth model that generates profound social inequalities and deprivation. Such populism is a cancer that tears at the very heart of an open, tolerant society, one which history teaches us we should all be deeply afraid of.

Perhaps this is why many are so worried about the visceral tone of the debate and what has been unleashed in the process. And what has been unleashed? If the Brexit vote illustrates anything, it is perhaps the deep sense of alienation and abandonment felt among the most deprived and marginalised sections of the white working class, abandoned for decades by the Conservative and New Labour projects. Some deprived neighbourhoods were, it would seem, literally no-go areas for Labour campaigners for Remain. The argument had been lost a long time ago. Many were fed up with ‘establishment politics’, and who could blame them?

And so a process of healing a divided nation begins. How will such anger and despair, unleashed by this referendum, be dealt with? If one question remains, when all the dust has settled, it is this: can Britain, outside of the European Union, forge a progressive growth model that can reduce inequality and work for all its people, in particular those who feel their voice has been marginalised for too long?  We can only hope that such anger can be channelled into progressive politics and there is the intellectual capacity, will and optimism to do so.

Jonathan Payne is Reader in Employment Studies at De Montfort University and a member of CURA (Centre for Urban Research on Austerity) as well as CROWE (Contemporary Research on Organisations, Work and Employment.

The Coming Fight Over Brexit

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Professor Jonathan Davies, director of CURA, offers his thoughts on Brexit.

After yesterday’s staggering Brexit vote, it is impossible to predict what lies ahead. It is clear, however, that responsibility lies at the feet of both the British and European elite. By a thousand cuts it has immiserated, marginalised, impoverished and fragmented working class communities, some of which voted by overwhelming majorities to leave the EU. It can be no surprise in these dire conditions that resentment is boiling across the continent. This vote is a seismic moment in the rolling crisis of Britain’s post-war economic and political system. It is a moment in the rolling crisis of Europe, where vast territories have been laid waste by waves of crisis and austerity.

For many people, the grinding realities of austerity and the lack of hope for the future manifest in the form of virulent anti-immigration sentiments. The politics of despair are rife. Fears have been successfully channelled by the ugly dog-whistle politics of the leave campaigns. This is extremely damaging, but there is nothing new about it. Provoking racism to deflect attention from their own actions has long been a tried and tested policy of right wing elites. And it can be a lot easier to blame other people at the bottom of the heap than to hold the powerful to account.

Yet nationalist resentment is not the only story. Many working class people reject racism – especially in London. The people of Spain and Greece show that a politics of hope is possible in their struggles against austerity, despite the awful conditions they face. Like it or not, the struggle ahead will be over the meaning of Brexit. This is a huge challenge for people who believe in solidarity, open borders, love the diversity immigration brings and reject the delusion that stopping immigration will mean more jobs for “British workers”. At its height in the early 2000s, the anti-globalisation movement rallied around the slogan “another world is possible”. Our common challenge is to find a way of making it happen.

 Jonathan Davies is Professor of Critical Policy Studies and Director of the Centre for Urban Research on Austerity at De Montfort Univiersity.