Let us not under-estimate the scale of the event. The decision by the British in their referendum on June 23rd resonates like a catastrophe. Since early this morning the press and British and European leaders have employed strong expressions and shock statements to try to grasp the immense consequences of this decision.
It's a tragedy in as far as the decision collides head on with the simple truth that the United Kingdom is without doubt an integral part of Europe. This is about far more than just a common geopolitical area. We live together, with values, reference points and desires that are deeply interwoven, not to speak of the English language which has today become the common language of the European zone.
Brexit is thus at least an act of defiance, at worst a denial of our common history and also of that which remains, despite all the tribulations, a shared idea: the European project. This project, forged in the immediate aftermath of World War II, was first of all built on Franco-German reconciliation. And if, in that recent prehistory, Charles de Gaulle opposed the joining of the United Kingdom (according to the old adage that “England is an island”), the project very quickly prospered to become the leading geopolitical and economic area on the planet. It's that idea that finds itself suddenly wiped away, that of a vast democratic, economic and social ambition.
The British 'no' is also a tragedy in as far as it signals the victory of the worst forces at work in Europe today. The political direction of the 52% no vote could not be clearer: it's a victory of the conservative and populist Right, it's a victory for the extreme right, forces seething in their paranoiac frustrations and their dreams of lost empire, carried along by an unrelenting xenophobia and by imaginary fears. The arrival of “hordes of migrants” was thus the main argument of the Brexiteers.
Enlargement : Illustration 1
In this respect the talented but repugnant Nigel Farage from the independence party UKIP is the true winner of this vote, which sends out an astonishing message. For Farage, the man who said this Friday morning “It's Independence Day!”, is not a typically British monstrosity. He is cast in the image of very many European political leaders, from Hungary's Viktor Orban to France's Marine Le Pen, and including several elected officials from Hollande, Poland, Italy and Denmark.
So it is this political camp, an extreme right that has in some cases had a makeover, skilfully adapted but still reactionary, which has just decided the fate of the European project. Simply to make this observation is enough to give the scale of the catastrophe. This was the particularity of this referendum campaign: the British Left and progressive forces were never able to put together a coherent plan to leave the European Union. So-called 'Lexit' – a contraction of 'Left' and 'exit' – evaporated and vanished during the course of the campaign, thus giving a full-scale demonstration of how the Left, in its values and profound ideas, can only be the propagandist for the European idea.
Given that it is a catastrophe, should one weep along with European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker, British premier David Cameron, City bankers and the financial markets? Certainly not. The British decision, which incidentally brings to a close 20 years of permanent blackmail by that country of the European Union, could bring forth new hopes if we take seriously the ideas of economist Joseph Schumpeter and his principle of creative destruction. Or, more simply, if one has the ambition of placing politics and its ideals back at the heart of this European construction.
There is, first of all, this evident truth: European citizens no longer want this European Union. Just a year ago the Greeks voted massively in a referendum to oppose the economic policies that the European institutions wanted to impose on them. Four months ago the Dutch said no to this European Union in a referendum by rejecting a planned treaty with Ukraine. Eleven years ago, in 2005, the French rejected plans for a Constitutional Treaty in a referendum.
In the space of 12 months a 'left-wing referendum' (in Greece) and a 'extreme-right referendum' (in the UK) have swept aside this European Union. One could react like the German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble when he spoke to the Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis during a Eurogroup meeting of finance ministers: “There's no question of changing European treaties at each election!” One could go along with that incredible warning given by Jean-Claude Juncker: “There can be no democratic choice against the European treaties.” One could disparage the thoughtlessness and the irresponsibility of those citizens and working classes who knock down our brilliant technocrats who insist that “There is no alternative...”.
That is what European leaders have done consistently since 2005, by ignoring the results of elections and referendums, sometimes even calling for a fresh vote when the first one doesn't suit them. To get around the French 'non' vote in 2005, President Nicolas Sarkozy and German chancellor Angela Merkel later came up with the Lisbon Treaty, which incorporated the worst of the rejected Constitutional Treaty. And François Hollande, who campaigned in 2012 promising a tough “renegotiation”, accepted defeat once he was elected.
This democratic denial has only grown since the financial crisis of 2008, which provided arguments and fuel for supporters of nationalism and the extreme right. The shameful handling of the refugee crisis in Europe has simply encouraged yet further the rise in power of the extreme right, giving legitimacy to their fantasies and obsession with national identity.
A time for clarification
We have thus arrived at a key moment of much-needed clarification. And that is welcome. The European Union has been taken away from the citizens. Not just by the markets and the financial elites. But also by a rootless political class which lives by the principle of irresponsibility and impunity, who like to say and do one thing in their own country, then do and say the opposite inside the “Brussels bubble”.
Like many others, Jean-Claude Juncker symbolises the way the EU has become remote from the citizens. For 16 years he was the prime minister of Luxembourg during which time he made this small nation a tax haven in the heart of the European zone, and was president of the Eurogroup for nine years. His nomination to the presidency of the European Commission was the result of horse-trading between the heads of state and government. Can one imagine what a British, Polish or French citizen might think of Mr Juncker's democratic legitimacy?
It is indeed this democratic collapse, it is indeed this refusal of any major reform of the European decision-making process, it is indeed these politics of austerity imposed by institutions on whose altar the people feel sacrificed that have, once again, been sanctioned. Not now by a small country on the margins of Europe, Greece. But by a political heavyweight and the second largest economy in the European Union, the United Kingdom.
Enlargement : Illustration 2
As a result, the British referendum has every chance of signing the death warrant of the European Union in its current form. Of course, a long 'exit' negotiation is now going to take place between London and member states. This is likely to take at least two years and it is very possible that our European leaders will work on getting round the British no vote through agreements that would leave the United Kingdom with one foot inside, one foot outside, in a situation which would not be radically different from that of today. It's possible but not certain.
This old world of a remote European Union, deaf to the aspirations of its citizens, blind to the new issues at stake on the planet, powerless to resolve crises, subordinate to the financial power-brokers, is dying. Should one completely despair about this?
Other European forces have emerged since 2011. They are progressive and are being built upon the ruins of a European social democracy what has lost its way in neoliberal Europe. Syriza in Greece, Podemos in Spain, the Five Star Movement in Italy (admittedly a complex phenomenon) … this reconstruction is stuttering, fragile and consists of advances and reversals. There are many failures and uncertain victories; the misguided ways of the French radical left and greens bear witness to the difficulty in creating something new, in building new political dynamics that are capable of keeping out the extreme right.
In this sense the British no vote could be an accelerator. It has first of all clearly shown that an 'exit' from the EU is a backwards step, paving the way for populists and the extreme right. Next it underlines the urgent need to reform the European Left to fight inside European institutions with two objectives: to ensure that universal suffrage is respected there; and allow the full deployment of alternative policies that the citizens want.
A first, decisive, step takes place this weekend, in Spain, in its Parliamentary elections on June 26th. The Podemos-Unidos coalition seems to be on the point of overtaking the PSOE socialist party. If that indeed occurs, the Spanish vote could lead to a coalition government led by Podemos. This movement certainly does not herald the start of a new European political dawn. But at least it has put democratic renewal at the heart of its political plans. That would be a first step towards the new European Union that, following June 23rd, now has to be rebuilt.
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- The French version of this article can be found here.
English version by Michael Streeter