Brexit and new beginnings
Now that the dust is beginning to settle on the United Kingdom’s decision to part ways with its European Union partners, the bloc as a whole needs to regroup and search its collective soul for the answers it needs to continue to make the European project a continued success.
The British are what the British are and no one should begrudge its electorate for having taken what most Europeans consider to have been a seriously misguided and misinformed decision. The die is now cast, as a famous European said some two millennia ago, and the European Union must get on with its business.
This is, however, not a case of business as usual – far from it. Not only has the EU lost its leading military power, one of its economic powerhouses and one of its biggest net contributors to its budget – it has also lost its first member state.
The shockwaves being caused by this latter consideration quite possibly outweigh these others, and all other, considerations. That the majority of a member state’s population has become so disillusioned with the grand European project is most concerning indeed and this fact cannot be simply swept under the carpet and ignored.
It is now time for the European Union to conduct a soul-searching exercise. The EU must learn some lessons if it is to stop the rot, lest what we are suggesting in this accompanying cartoon comes to fruition.
Meeting yesterday, the EU’s founding members – France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg – admitted that the EU has not demonstrated the energy and gumption needed to work together on important issues such as migration, unemployment and terrorism.
In a joint statement, the leaders said they need to find ways to better deal with the different levels of ambition with regard to European integration and that they need to make sure that Europe becomes better at fulfilling the expectations of all its citizens.
They did not, however, present any concrete plans on how to tackle the union’s many pressing issues, or the disillusionment and EU-fatigue that is palpable in many segments of European society.
Instead, they focused on stressing that the UK’s divorce from the bloc must be as speedy as possible. This is a fundamental mistake. The issues at stake here cannot simply be swept under the rug as the threats of the financial crisis were in late 2007 and early 2008.
To ignore the fact that the bloc needs to reinvent itself in the wake of the Brexit vote and to not set about searching the collective European soul for answers is as misguided as they perhaps view the result of the Brexit referendum. Perhaps that discussion was held behind closed doors, another mistake if it is to prevent the bloc from further collapse – if not in its very makeup, then at the very least for its citizens’ morale.
The European Union’s leaders cannot ignore the fact that something is rotten in the bloc, that member states’ populations are rejecting, by and large, the EU’s federalist approach and that the real issues and concerns affecting its citizens need to be addressed in a better and more tangible fashion.
It is, however, understandable that the first order of business is to set about the UK-EU divorce proceedings – no mean feat. They will begin doing just that next week when the EU's policy commissioners meet tomorrow in Brussels to take stock of developments. The European Commission, the EU's executive arm, must make recommendations to Britain's partners on the principles they might use to guide the exit negotiations.
That will be followed by a twoday summit of the 28 EU leaders opening on Tuesday, where they will seek to activate as soon as possible Article 50 of the EU's governing Lisbon Treaty that contains the exit clause.
No country has ever left the EU before, so no one knows exactly how the process will pan out. Until it formally withdraws, the UK will remain a member, with all the rights and obligations that go with membership – an uncomfortable situation to say the least and one that the other 27 leaders will not seek to prolong. It is, however, in Britain's interest to delay the process so it can better prepare its exit conditions and pressure other EU nations to make concessions.
The European Parliament will also hold an emergency session on Tuesday hours before the summit, but the session is only likely to focus on a political resolution taking note of the UK vote and stating the assembly's position on what should happen next.
These are the technicalities, in brief, of what will happen next week. But beyond those technicalities, the EU’s 27 leaders who intend to remain within the bloc need to begin addressing the malaise that has spread, and which may very well continue to spread post-Brexit, within the bloc.
Like parents about to divorce, they need to focus on the technicalities but at the same time they need to reassure their children that they will, somehow, change things and make everything all right.