Beyond the Economic Impacts of the EU Referendum
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On Thursday, June 23rd, citizens of the United Kingdoms flocked to the polls to vote on a referendum to determine if the UK would remain in the European Union. Volunteers counted votes into the early morning and dawn rose over a UK no longer interested in remaining in the EU.
Far-right members of UKIP and the Conservative Party comprise the leadership of the Leave campaign. Their success at polls is due to their ability to ride and feed a new wave of nativism and nationalism sweeping through the UK. This new political trend is similar to the far-right and alt-right movements in the US in 2010 and 2016.
Nigel Farage, a leader of UKIP and the main spokesperson of the Leave campaign, states that he hopes the UK’s “independence” from the EU will lead to some of the other 27 EU to leave the confederation. He indicates his hopes that enough countries will leave the EU that the entire project will then end.
Farage, in a victory speech around 4:00 AM in London, called the EU referendum vote an historic victory, UK’s Independence Day, and a victory won without “a single bullet being fired”. The disgusting irony in this phrasing is that Jo Cox, a British MP and major supporter of the Remain campaign, was shot and killed last week by a man in favor of leaving the EU.
Circumstances of this speech aside, Farage previously said with near-glee that in British politics, “violence is the next step” in anger over EU membership. This is where context of the Leave campaign and UKIP in general matters. UKIP, a party formed on a renewed British absurdist conservatism and several phobias (xeno- and islamo- to name a couple), comes from a resurgence of far-right anti-outsider movements across the UK.
The English Defense League (EDL) may be the vilest of group movements that saw their inception during this rightward sweep. The EDL has led riots in the streets, threatened Muslims in public, and spread rumors of foreign “Muslamic rape gangs” wandering through the UK.
Leave campaign leadership has, by some standards, incited violence but not yet to the same degree of the EDL. However, members of the EDL and other radical groups of the sort have joined UKIP’s base. From there, these radicals have helped direct Remain campaign in spreading a new round of mistruths, exaggerations, and myths about the EU, Muslims, and refugees. EDL protesters carried Leave banners and chanted outside of mosques during the weeks leading up to the EU referendum.
While Farage may pat himself on the back for his perception of a peaceful revolution of sorts, he and his compatriots have accepted a new normal in rhetorical violence and have opened the doors to a new round of potentially violent policy against outsiders. In his victory speech, he calls the Leave vote a “victory for real people… ordinary people… decent people”. The people who have the most to lose by this vote are real, ordinary, decent people, too, but Farage’s rise to power is entirely predicated on his ability to identify who in the room are outsiders.
The shining dawn of the UK’s “independence” has swiftly turned into a midmorning of nasty threats of violence. Before the close of the weekend, a disgusting climate of harassment, bigotry, and hate has taken the UK. This is not the civilized, noble nation that the UK intends to be.
The irony is that the man claiming to have achieved “independence” without violence has shepherded a radical, violent British right into popular UK politics, and in doing so has potentially defeated the most successful peacekeeping organization the world has seen.
The EU as peacekeeper
The EU has led to the most peaceful period of European history — ever. Sure, part of the Troubles continued during the beginning of the EU, but the 25-year-old conflict rooted in centuries of historical tension ended within 5 years of the establishment of the EU. In the 20 years since, the peace has held fairly well (though the scars still exist). The EU, of course, isn’t the only reason for the success of the peace in Northern Ireland, but the Good Friday Agreement is technically dependent upon membership in the EU.
Most consider the Troubles a civil conflict rather than inter-state, but the Troubles aren’t the only historical conflict between EU members.
The deadliest wars the world has seen occurred in Europe between many of today’s EU member states. World War I and World War II, fought primarily in Western Europe, were the culmination of centuries of bloody conflict for territory in Europe. Current members of the EU straddle both sides of both wars.
Nazi Germany invaded or annexed or conquered almost the entirety of what now makes up the EU. Many countries did not have time to join an alliance before being swept into the war.
Some might say that WWI and WWII are too far away from modern day to have any impact on politics. History is an important context, though. The American South reignited the debate over flying the Confederate Flag, a symbol from a war fought 1861–1865. History takes a lot to get over, and WWII is a lot closer to 2016 than the American Civil War to 2015.
Later in modernity, though, there are more examples of political differences leading to direct and indirect war. The Cold War, beginning in 1947, split Europe down the middle until the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, just 27 years ago.
Again, Germany and Berlin were split down the middle. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Germany are often identified as the leaders of the EU in its current form. 27 years separate a military division through Berlin and Germany’s key role in today’s European Union.
No country ever launched any nukes, but the stakes grew as the US and the USSR looked ready to start another war, this time with technology capable of wiping out entire cities.
US and USSR tanks faced each other at Checkpoint Charlie in Berlin on October 27, 1961. Thankfully, no one fired. This was not a peaceful time.
Today, Berlin sits near the center of the EU. Countries to the east and south were in the Eastern Bloc (USSR-aligned). Countries to the west and north were in the Western Bloc (US-aligned).
The EU was established just 4 years after the end of the Cold War. No member states have since gone to war with one another. In fact, non-EU former USSR countries have gone to war with each other more than they have attempted to go to war with now-EU countries.
The overwhelming majority of post-Cold War violence motivated along Cold War-divisions has happened in countries like Afghanistan and Ukraine. The EU has remained an exceedingly successful organization for peace.
When it comes to keeping member states from fighting each other, the EU has been more successful than the Arab League, the African Union, OPEC, and even the UN. Members of these political, security-oriented, and economic organizations have indeed fought one another as recently as today.
Immediately following the announcement that the EU referendum went in favor of Farage and his movement, right-wing politicians across the EU wasted little time asserting that they would attempt to move their countries down a similar path. Far-right French politician Marine Le Pen, far-right Dutch politician Geert Wilders, far-right German politician Beatrix von Storch, the far-right Swedish Democratic Party, the far-right Danish People’s Party, the Far-right Greek Golden Dawn, and others have already spoken their support for exits from the EU for their corresponding nations.
While these referendums aren’t all entirely likely, the fact that these politicians, leaders, and political parties have a voice and constituency in their respective countries shows a worrying trend across Europe. These politicians and movements have anti-immigrant and anti-outsider rhetoric built into their party or movement platforms, and several have directly incited violence against Muslims or Arab/South Asian immigrants.
It’s shameful that belligerent movements like those forming the base of the Leave campaign have put what may be a first nail in the coffin of the most successful organization for peace the world may have ever seen. The coming months will be telling.
