Also, can someone explain to me the steps by which parties in Britain create coalitions (or whatever) and then put a new PM in place? I'm an American, so any reference to American politics is super helpful.
I'm quite positive that the remaining powers of the EU, starting with Germany and France are actually delighted at leveling the playing field and harmonising the EU commitment for the remaining members.
So if the UK wants back in the EU, they will certainly be welcome with the open arms, but without any of the special deals and privileges that UK has enjoyed.
If only for this reason and Brexit was a terrible mistake.
This guide [0] from the BBC might help to understand how coalitions are formed. It's currently looking very tricky as the splits are crazy [1].
[0] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-40209087
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/politics/ng-interactive/2017/jun...
This election was always about the opposition within the Conservative party rather than Labour.
The hardness of Brexit does not depend solely on the British government. The EU administration has a huge interest to make Brexit as hard as possible to avoid other member states from feeling the urge to leave.
But on the bright side (for us in the rest of EU) it's also more likely to result in a "softer" brexit, if the election result is seen as a vote against May's Conservative plan.
That said, whoever replaces May - once she has been eaten by the Tory backbenchers - is likely to have been an original Brexit backer, which May was not. For example Boris Johnson. So it's all very uncertain at this point.
Edit: Was unsure about the exact date of negotiations - they were set to start on june 19th but it's uncertain if it can now.
Someone actually created a throwaway account to deliver a salty (now removed) comment that I should shut up if I didn't know what I was talking about - referring to "I believe.." in my original comment. Otherwise this would "Turn into reddit".
Someone is having a bad morning.
Dear lord that would put a ribbon on everything!
The problem is that, by all accounts, while BoJo might come across as a nice guy by all accounts he'd likely make an awful PM (e.g. read about the chaos that was his last leadership attempt).
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jun/09/theresa-may...
I don't think the process can be reversed but there is certainly a lot of leeway in how it will happen.
However, it's unlikely Britain would back out of the decision. I think the best we can hope for is a Norway-like approach (EEA).
It was this that the Lib Dems were (weakly) campaigning on in the election - to give the people the vote whether to accept the deal or stay in the EU after the negotiations were complete.
If neither the UK nor the EU desires this break-up, then it won't happen. It all depends on what the UK government does (which realistically speaking probably does not include pulling the emergency brake on the Brexit, unfortunately).
The EU want us to stay though, so at the moment I think a reversal would be quite painless. In a year's time, maybe not.
So its reversible, and if there was a change of government that wanted to reverse it I suspect the EU would go along. OTOH, it seems near certain that if a coalition is formed, it will be a Tory-DUP coalition, which won't want to reverse it (the DUP seems to want a softer Brexit, but it's not clear that the EU is interested in that.)
If a government can't be formed.(which doesn't seem implausible), then my understanding is that there is another election in fairly short order.
I'm putting that qualification in because, frankly, no-one knows the answer since it's never been put to a court. Moreover, I don't think it will matter. What will matter is whether or not the political will exists to make it happen.
For the next few weeks the winning party will negotiate with the other parties and try to create a coalition. If that fails they can either try a minority government or a new election will be called.
This time around a coalition will be hard, the third party (Lib Dems) went into a coalition with the Tories in 2010. It almost destroyed them as a party so they won't do it again.
I think the voting reflects the general uncertainty about the Brexit process, plus some of the under 30s actually getting out of bed this time...
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2017/06/...
I actually saw queues outside polling stations yesterday.
That's a terrible reason for FPTP. As soon as you have a third party, you run the risk of coalitions.
What's so bad about coalitions anyway? Germany is run by coalitions and it's a world economic power.
I don't accept that myself, but it's ecactly what happens to the Liberal Democrats in 2010 - they entered a coalition, agreed to policies that their voter base didn't accept and paid heavily for the sense of betrayal it fostered.
The lib Dems wanted a second referendum about what it would mean, I think, e.g. soft Vs hard.
So it can't really be reversed but the angle can be changed as that has always been unclear.