I didn't know it would coincide with two other economic challenges: COVID, and Ukraine. Disentangling the effects of those three events is like trying to decode entrails; and anyway, I think "it's too early to say" (Chou Enlai).
I have no Bregret.
I didn't know it would coincide with two other economic challenges: COVID, and Ukraine. Disentangling the effects of those three events is like trying to decode entrails; and anyway, I think "it's too early to say" (Chou Enlai).
I have no Bregret.
You lost me here. Recover from what, exactly? You've alluded to some problems here - which I'm happy to consider as valid - but you haven't described them as anything but "political" and "economic". Was Britain on some terrible downhill plummet in these areas?
It wans't a plummet; it's that the EU is designed to prevent certain kinds of political change, in particular changes that I want to see. By staying in the EU, we'd be accepting that we can't ever make those kinds of changes. I don't think we should make that kind of concession.
That's the politics; as for the economics, I don't share the German view of how to manage the European economy. Germany dominates European banking and finance. I think European bankers have made some awful decisions in the last couple of decades, and we have been dragged along. I don't think Tory economics is any better; but we won't have neo-liberals running the UK forever.
What positive things do you think came out of Brexit?
It almost always comes from people who didn't care about economics until Brexit, and now won't shut up about it...whilst being completely unaware of the lack of substance of their argument...they just read something on the BBC website written by a 21-year old politics grad (btw, this is the real issue with the UK, the Cabinet is one of the only places in British society where you actually have people who are up to the job...and I am not a Tory or Leave voter).
The positive things are the things you see happening: financial deregulation, enterprise zones/freeports, greater political agency over economic decisions (this sounds soft, but the difference in spirit is huge...dirigiste corporatism is popular with the civil servant elite as in Brussels...voters here just don't like it), reorienting trade towards growing economies, can choose not to move closer to China/Russia, the list goes on and on.
I will say this another way: if the UK didn't leave, would GDP have been higher? No. It wouldn't have been lower either. Brexit offers more opportunities in the future, it is up to govt to take them but by itself it has very little economic significance.
Insufficient regulation is the eternal excuse...it is like saying that your business failed because you can't beat your staff to force them to work more hours. No-one wants to talk about the fact that most regulators are idiots, and will fuck it up (which they have done post-GFC, we have given massive powers to the BoE and they have done nothing else but cause financial problems...but the media just wants to talk about "the bankers, the bonuses").
Either way, you are seeing the UK move very swiftly towards the heavy corporatist banking system in Europe which requires bailouts and subsidies every few years (you are complaining about the GFC, Europe has been doing GFC-size interventions to save their banking system every few years SINCE the GFC). Financial deregulation is the only way to stop this. It will be huge for growth because the UK's financial markets are ossifying heavily under current regs.
> financial deregulation, enterprise zones/freeports, greater political agency over economic decisions
we cannot do deviate much from the norms any way, otherwise we'll lose access to the free market
and where are all these new trade deals that are better than the EU's?
Lets face it, the EU has been a massive misdirection for the tories and the propaganda papers to hide their huge failings
let not talk about the massive f*k up of NI issue or the fact Scotland will try and get independance if given the chance, the massasive screw up to our miltary by coming out of Galilieo
I didn't mention trade deals. Exports outside the EU are up significantly, exports to the EU are above pre-Brexit levels but have continued to stagnate due to weak growth in the EU.
The massive misdirection argument is just...bizarre. I have no idea why people believe this...you see this literally every time the govt does anything good amongst people who seem to be terminally online.
NI issues have been solved due to the EU deciding that attempting to break up another country to reverse a democratic decision wasn't a great look. Independence in Scotland has never had a majority and still isn't particularly close to it. Military? Most EU countries do not spend the required amount by NATO (btw, this Galileo thing is some kind of bot online comment that I have seen elsewhere...Remainers are genuinely the biggest bot thinkers, "this is just a distraction", "Galileo", "where are the trade deals"...you are arguing with ghosts in your head).
>No, we won't. This is a common misconception amongst people who stopped reading about Brexit after it happened...the deal we got largely preserves access to the Single Market and will allow regulatory divergence.
Have a read of this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EU%E2%80%93UK_Trade_and_Cooper... - mainlt the part..... " For its part, the EU insisted that the price for UK access to the European Single Market was compliance with EU subsidies, social, environmental and other regulations to avoid distorting competition in the single market."
so you're completely wrong there
>I didn't mention trade deals. Exports outside the EU are up significantly, exports to the EU are above pre-Brexit levels but have continued to stagnate due to weak growth in the EU.
Uk is almost in recession, where the rest of the EU is doing relatively very well
>The massive misdirection argument is just...bizarre
It will be you, if you've no idea why cameron presented the non binding referendum in the first place
>NI issues have been solved due to the EU deciding that attempting to break up another country to reverse a democratic decision wasn't a great look.
really? I'm not even going to answer that drivel - almost straight from daily express
They said it: they "objected to the EU on political and economic grounds" and now they are out of the EU.
> Sure, leaver's favorite excuse "Things got worse, but it's not because of Brexit".
That's not true, they said that they expected a short term economical decline: "and I figured we could recover, in about a decade, economically.".
I wonder if chatGPT could remind you if you flood your favourite phrases on a comment that they don't hold.
No doubt the areas of politics you take an interest in are different from the ones I do, but in almost every area I saw policies that no-one wanted being forced through with the excuse that it was an EU requirement, and putting an end to that is enough to justify Brexit. Trust and accountability in the political system is priceless.
Zero regret. Leaving is heart surgery and within 10 years of officially leaving I don't think we'll be worse off.
Politically, there are no shared constituencies. I don't mean in the sense of individual candidates; I mean there are no cross-border leaders or parties. We barely know the names of the party leaders in neighbouring countries. The EU is a treaty organisation, not a shared democracy.
Policy initiatives come from the Commission, which is a collection of political has-beens, failed politicians that are of no further value in their own countries. The European Council is simply an ad-hoc gathering of representatives of the government of the day in their respective countries; as a body, it has no legityimacy whatsoever. The third leg of EU "democracy" is the EU Parliament. Apart from it's lack of electoral legitimacy, it was deliberately made feeble. It can't initiate legislation. Debates in the parliament chamber are so polite and decorous that it's impossible to stay awake - nobody listens to broadcasts of proceedings in the EU Parliament.
The EU is very corrupt. To a large extent, that is because it is free from proper oversight; in theory, the Parliament is a constraint on the power of the executive (the Commission). In practise, the EU has exercised that power only once, when it became clear that roughly all Commissioners were corrupt. The only power they had was to sack the entire Commission, which they did. Once. And it didn't make much difference. The Parliament's powers have since been increased a little, I know.
In theory, the EU has a border with common rules. In practice, that's not how it works; EU member nations just love it when the refugees they have admitted decide to leave for another European country, relying on Free Movement. They build fences to stop people entering, but not to stop people leaving.
A number of very authoritarian countries from the East were admitted to the EU a couple of decades ago, and they are doing things like sacking judges that disagree with the government. The EU is doing nothing to prevent this kind of behaviour, although it is a violation of the treaties between member states. I don't want to be in a treaty organisation with racists and dictators.
There; I hope that helps.
Also curious what you think of the perspective that acknowledges most of the dysfunction you're naming while considering it part of the growing pains of figuring out how to do transnational politics as a species. RE no cross-border parties, what about parties like Volt Europa?
I don't know anywhere there is a clear, plain and unbiased presentation of the EU institutions.
As regards growing pains, I think the problems are not a matter of adjustments that need to be made; they are fundamental to the principles of the EU. The idea was to create a region where nations would not go to war with one-another, because they were bound together by trade.
For that to work, trade had to be conducted on a level playing field; that meant free movement of capital and labour, so that corporations could invest where the profits were greatest. At the same time, there had to be controls on government subsidies; governments were supposed to privatise everything, and could not use taxpayer money to help their national champions.
The UK privatised nearly everything; other countries weren't so enthusiastic.
Without these rules, the EU is nothing.
I don't see how the EU can "grow up" out of that. It's not a set of policies, that can be tweaked by a stroke of the legislative pen every few years; it's a bunch of international treaties, with 27 signatories, with many of the signatories having held national referendums on them.
Regarding "Volt Europa": I've never heard of it. Are they new? They've never canvassed me, so perhaps they came into existence since Brexit. Ah - in the 2021 local elections, Volt UK stood one council candidate, somewhere in Warwickshire. They've never stood a candidate for the UK Parliament, nor any European Parliament candidates. They've never won an election. Apparently they are federalists; even among pro-Europeans in UK, not many want to subordinate the UK to an EU super-state.