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Brave New Britain?

Jan 31, 2020

Britain’s Conservative Party has fulfilled its campaign pledge to “get Brexit done.” But much remains undone – in particular, sorting out the United Kingdom’s future relationship with the European Union.

In this Big Picture, Chris Patten, a former Conservative Party chairman and former EU commissioner for external affairs, says Britain’s post-EU future is shrouded in “waffle, wishful thinking, and […] mendacity.” Columbia University’s Willem H. Buiter, meanwhile, says the UK should brace itself for years of painful negotiations and policy implementation in order to “make the best of a bad Brexit.”

Similarly, Princeton University’s Harold James says that, in their enthusiasm to leave the EU, the Tories seem to have forgotten what their Conservative heroine, Margaret Thatcher, always understood: an economic tradeoff is inevitable. But Daniel Gros of the Centre for European Policy Studies is more upbeat, arguing that the UK could develop a productive “special relationship” with the EU like the one it has with the United States.

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j. von Hettlingen Feb 3, 2020

Will a “brave, new” Britain emerge after keaving the European Union? Last December Boris Johnson won a landslide victory on the platform of “getting Brexit done.” Now he has the mandate to do so, but there is much to be done in sorting out Britain’s future relationship with the EU. It remains unclear whether the negotations will go his way, and he achieves his goals. Four analysts give their take on what the future holds for Britain, and the challenges it faces.
Chris Patten, a Conservative with years of government service under Margaret Thatcher and John Major, before becoming EU Commissioner for External Affairs in 1999, says Britain is entering the “unknown,” contrary to what Boris Johnson said earlier today. In his first speech after Brexit, Johnson boasted that Britain’s economy would “soar like Superman,” while talking tough on post-Brexit trade deal with the EU. As liberal democracy has come under attack, with China and Russia undermining the rules-based order, “the UK has chosen an odd and dangerous time to decide to go it alone.”
According to Patten, Britain’s post-EU future is shrouded in “waffle, wishful thinking, and the sort of mendacity that these days appears to exact no political price.” During his 2016 Brexit-campaign, Johnson lied about the benefits of leaving, while dismissing “the question of costs.” The tragedy is that Brexiteers, eager to deliver with “quasi-religious fervor” that they “regard any unwelcome economic estimate as an attempt to talk the country down. In any case, they insist, whatever the cost” – even the breakup of the UK – it is regaining sovereignty and taking back control that counts.
Willem H. Buiter says in the face of “uncertainty about the nature of the trade regime, the wider economic relationship, and the political relationship between the UK and the EU that will prevail after the transition period ends,” Johnson will not get Brexit “done” by the end of 2020. Instead, Britain “ can now look forward to the painful grind of negotiations and policy implementation, probably lasting many years, to make the best of a bad Brexit.” It took more than a decade for the EU and Canada to negotiate the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA).
Britain will not be able to negotiate from a position of strength with the rest of the world “relative to that of the European Union, when it negotiates as a single bloc on behalf of its member states.” Some Brexiteers really think they could turn Britain into “an across-the-board deregulatory, low-tax haven” – like a “Singapore-on-Thames” – a workable approach but only in the financial sector. Ending the free movement for EU citizens could "cause the most severe and lasting damage to the supply side of the UK economy." It remains to be seen whether the “points-based” immigration policy, along the lines of the Australian or Canadian models would attract “talented foreign students.”
Harold James reminds the Tories of their “heroine,” Margaret Thatcher, who “always understood: an economic tradeoff is inevitable.” She would have chafed at Johnson's illusion that Britain would enter “a world of new, attractive alternatives from which to choose.” There were certainly times when her frustration with Europe boiled over. But officials in her circle said they never heard her propose taking Britain out of the EU. Were she in power in 2016, she would have decided to back remaining in the EU on renegotiated terms.
Although Thatcher was wary of the European project creating a “superstate” that came to pose a threat to “national sovereignty, as exercised through regular parliamentary processes. Yet in a 1988 speech at the College of Europe in Bruges, she rejected “collectivism and corporatism at the European level,” even while maintaining the view that Britain’s “destiny is in Europe, as part of the Community.” She was not a proto-Brexiter but an enthusiastic supporter of the single market, with the ambition to set out an alternative vision to compete with that advanced by European federalists.
Daniel Gros is more upbeat, arguing that the UK could develop a productive “special relationship” with Europe. But he warns the EU against exploiting “its economic advantage when the trade talks start at the beginning of March.” Brexit could still help develop “productive special relationship in which the UK remains a close partner of the EU and makes a valuable contribution to Europe’s peace and prosperity.”
Apart from trade, Britain and the EU do share common interests in environmental, defence and security issues. Gros mourns Brexit, saying it takes a toll on the bloc's economy and dynamism, because Britain is Europe’s second largest economy, a veto-member of the UN Security Council and a nuclear power. Hence he urges the EU to be amenable and not to adopt the aloof "take it or leave it" approach.
As ruthless as Boris Johnson is - he wants to have his cake and eat it too - he will seek to bend the EU to his will, because he wants to prove to his voters that he is a tough negotiator and does not have the intention to be a one-term prime ministser. The EU needs to demonstrate its authority too. If Brexit would become a success, it would inspire other anti-EU members to follow suit.
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Mirek Fatyga Jan 31, 2020

Finally, what a relief.
- P. Kamath Feb 1, 2020
  
  Yes. The sun will rise in the East and set in the West as usual , to morrow and thereafter!
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