Anti-Establishment feeling sent shock waves across democracies
action? So, in the face of all the main political party leaders, all of the UK’s main foreign allies, and all the main economic experts telling voters not to vote Leave, the UK decided – to vote Leave. The Establishment had been roundly defeated.
Ever since the 1960s there has been an attraction for some to back the anti-Establishment forces. Indeed, even after a decade in power, New Labour never saw itself as the Establishment.
Devolution has helped the SNP, clearly now the ruling power in Edinburgh, to portray itself as battling against the Establishment; that is, Whitehall. In the 2014 Scottish independence referendum the image of an out-of-touch Establishment was summoned up when the Putin, who believed climate change was a Chinese economic conspiracy, who was protectionist on trade, who described Nato as obsolete and who wanted to scrap the Iran nuclear deal.
It may well be that Mr Trump’s first foreign foray is a state visit to Britain with a trip north of the Border to his “beloved Scotland” thrown in.
If the often ridiculed “special relationship” means anything, then it must show its value in persuading the new president that while on the campaign trail the world might seem a simple case of black and white, in reality, it is a range of greys and that practising the art of diplomacy is greatly helped by listening to and seeking counsel from trusted friends and allies.
With political change in America and it also possibly sweeping across Europe, the Age of Uncertainty is set to continue in 2017. Yes campaign pitched itself against the might of the Whitehall machine and Project Fear.
As the campaign progressed and the more strident the message of doom emanated from London, the more many ordinary Scots became not only immune to the constant shroud-waving but positively antagonistic towards it.
Yet having won the battle for the Union, the Establishment, fronted by David Cameron, did not heed the mistakes of the 2014 campaign but repeated them in the in/out battle of 2016.
Project Fear rose up to warn punters that a vote to Leave the European Union would be like putting a “bomb under the economy”.
Earlier this month in Italy, the
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