TO LEAVE ENGLISH STYLE

Confusion among politicians and businessmen, complete outrage or glee of ordinary people in social networks, mixed-up forecasts of experts, a surge in xenophobic attitudes, headline resignations, agitated markets, the lowest exchange rate of the British pound in more than thirty years, calls to hold a new plebiscite, rumours about the possibility of Scotland and Northern Ireland leaving the United Kingdom and the threat of collapse of the EU itself in the future. Such is the first reaction to the results of a referendum conducted in the UK on 23 June, during which supporters of the country's exit from the EU won with 51.9 per cent of the vote (17.41 million people) against 48.1 per cent (16.14 million people) of those who preferred to stay with Brussels. The turnout exceeded 72 per cent (more than 33.5 million people). Within a short space of time, the coinage Brexit (British exit) has gained immense popularity all over the world, surpassing in significance Euro-2016, the shooting in Orlando, the coming Olympic Games as well as other events of global calibre. We are witnessing history in the making - the UK and the EU will never be the same again. The referendum has shown that the European Union no longer seems to be the highest achievement of the Western political model and that not only it can enlarge but also contract.

In the days immediately after Brexit, European officials were getting over the shock. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the decision of the Britons has undermined the European unity, and now the EU needs to learn a lesson. European Council President Donald Tusk sounded self-complacent making a statement to the effect that now it is not the time to go in for dramatics. Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz expressed confidence that now "no stone would be left upon another in Europe". Chairman of the Bundestag's Committee on Foreign Affairs Norbert Rottgen called the referendum results the "greatest blow to European integration in its history". Member of European Parliament Dominique Riquet opined that the UK has started an unworthy show, while the European house is on fire. Some officials simply resigned, as did Jonathan Hill, UK European Commissioner for Financial Stability, Financial Services and Capital Markets Union.

In for a penny, in for a pound

The same decision was taken by Prime Minister David Cameron, who promised to resign by October this year. The head of the British government, who got himself into the mess called Brexit, said that it would not be right for him to "try to be the captain that steers the country to its next destination". Holding a referendum on Britain's membership of the European Union was one of Cameron's election promises in May 2015, but then the politician began to advocate the idea of staying within the EU. Brussels did Cameron a favour by agreeing to modify the terms of Britain's membership, but that could not change anything. As the saying goes, in for a penny, in for a pound. In the meantime, all of the prime minister's fellow countrymen will have to resign their EU membership, though nearly half of them were utterly displeased with this decision.

In fact, the country found itself divided into two parts. It is noteworthy that even after the announcement of the referendum results the arguments "for" and "against" UK membership still remain extremely vague. It appears that many Britons, who came to vote on 23 June, were not fully aware of all the consequences of their decision. Immediately after the completion of the Brexit referendum, Google Trends spotted a spike in British user requests inquiring "What does it mean to leave the EU?" The second most searched term was "What is the EU", which makes you think at the very least and feel dismay at the most. Experts explain what happened by the fact that Brexit supporters tried to play on heartstrings of the British, appealing more to emotions than to the logic, and not speaking frankly about the economic consequences of leaving the EU.

Economic pros and cons

Meanwhile, British Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne said that leaving the EU would cost the country 30bn pounds (42.4bn dollars). The main arguments are that spending on EU membership is compensated many times over by the profit generated by the access to the European single market. This directly affects the financial sector which gives employment to 2.1 million British, and now many banks and funds such as JP Morgan and HSBC may decide to move their operations outside the UK. EU membership facilitates trade, creates jobs, provides for the movement of capital, and keeps lower prices for consumers. After the exit from the EU, multinational companies such as car manufacturers will certainly transfer their production to other European countries. The EU is the main trading partner for London, but after Brexit new duties and tariffs will inevitably be imposed. There are several options for cooperation between the EU and a non-EU country, in which case reference is most often made to Switzerland and Norway. Thus, Norway is part of the European Economic Area but does not have access to the financial sector. Meanwhile, Switzerland concludes separate agreements with Brussels on each sector of the economy. Whichever model is chosen by the UK, it will lose the right to vote during decision-making in the EU. As a result, the British government will be forced to increase the income tax, raise excise duties on petrol and alcohol, and reduce funding of social programmes in the field of public health and education in the country.

However, Brexit supporters insist that, having left the EU, London will rather save billions of pounds, which could be spent on domestic science, health and education instead of financing Brussels' needs. The number of jobs will increase as the business will be freed from the Brussels bureaucracy; small and medium-sized enterprises, mainly working for the domestic market, will especially benefit. The EU is expected to continue to trade with the United Kingdom because it is too important a partner that provides reliable financial investments in the European budget. As for the customs duties, they will grow by no more than it is stipulated by the WTO rules. In addition, London will be free to choose trade agreements with other countries, such as China. The country will also benefit from regaining full control over its borders, thereby reducing the number of migrants, and so the British will be more likely to find a job. The United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) urges to impose the same restrictions on hiring people from EU countries as are in place for citizens of other countries. Brexit opponents, on the other hand, argue that the influx of migrants stimulates the economy. Furthermore, in exchange for access to the EU Single Market, London is likely to assume obligations regarding migration which are comparable to those that existed earlier.

Political pros and cons

Meanwhile, Brexit supporters more readily used such concepts as freedom, sovereignty and democracy than economic arguments. UKIP leader Nigel Farage said that the British gained their country and declared the day of the referendum the UK's Independence Day. UK Justice Secretary Michael Gove, in turn, argued that a British exit from the EU could spark "the democratic liberation of a whole continent".

But even in this case arguments are extremely ambivalent. Brexit opponents say that without the EU, Great Britain will become a small state, significantly weakened geopolitically and more vulnerable in terms of security. Thus, Cameron said that the Islamic State group would only be happy to see Great Britain leaving the EU. Brexit supporters maintain that the UK has always been and will continue to be a global player since no-one has cancelled its status as a nuclear power, a member of NATO and the UN Security Council, and taken away its "special relationship" with the United States. On the contrary, now, without Brussels, Britain's voice will be better heard on the world stage. Moreover, without being bound by EU human rights standards, London will be better off to ensure its national security. However, there is the question of whether the United Kingdom will be able to stay united. As it happens, Scotland has for the most part voted to stay in the EU (62 per cent), and therefore its government is going to hold a new referendum on independence. The first referendum was held in 2014, and more than 50 per cent of those voted expressed themselves in favour of remaining part of the UK. But now that Britain has decided not to be part of the EU, everything has changed. Sinn Fein, the largest nationalist party of Northern Ireland, also stated that the British exit from the European Union would be the basis for holding a referendum on reunification with Ireland.

However, the EU itself is under the threat of weakening of its economic and political power because the British decision can become a precedent. Eurosceptics of all kinds feel victorious, at least for now. Thus, in Finland, signatures are being collected for a petition demanding a referendum on withdrawal from the EU. The leaders of the Dutch right-wing Party for Freedom, Geert Wilders, and the French National Front, Marine Le Pen, have made the same calls. According to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Centre, the disapproval of the EU in many countries including Spain and France is even stronger than in the UK. In any case, following in Cameron's footsteps, other European politicians can now begin to require from Brussels special concessions, which may lead to a change in the EU structure. Furthermore, the EU either will weaken in terms of security since London bore a considerable part of military expenditures (21 per cent of the total EU military expenditure) or the participating countries will have to allocate more money for this purpose.

In addition, the voice of Brussels will be less authoritative in negotiations with Russia, the United States, China and other global players. Against the background of the relative weakness of France, the leading role in the EU will ultimately be assigned to Germany, but it seems that the country is not too happy with such a scenario. Firstly, it will have to be a leader not so much in the political as in the economic sense, which means that now Berlin will have almost single-handedly solve problems of weak Eastern countries of the EU. Secondly, there will be no one to blame for failures or shift responsibility onto. Thirdly, because of the migrant crisis, the leadership of Angela Merkel is not as firm as it seemed before.

The United States has also been against the British exit from the EU. During his visit to London in April, Barack Obama clearly outlined his position actively supported by the US media which almost unanimously insisted that it would weaken not only Britain and the EU, but also Washington's influence on Brussels. It is noteworthy that in 1960, de Gaulle explained his veto on the UK joining the EEC exactly by this argument. The French president believed that London would be an active promoter of US interests in Europe. Now, without London, the European Union is going to be less compliant including in respect of the Transatlantic Partnership which has so actively been promoted by Obama of late. But this is a topic for another discussion. Moreover, the United States has NATO - the only structure that brings together the whole of Europe in military terms, therefore no one has any other options.

Questions without exact answers

So, what is going on right before our eyes? A logical continuation of history? Taking a retrospective look a few centuries deep, one would immediately recall that the United Kingdom had always been on its own and opposed Germany and France on the continent, so it is naive to believe that the successor to the British Empire has parted with all of its ambitions over the past decades. Can it be that ordinary EU citizens have really become tired of all the consequences of globalization, knowing that it involves not only benefits but also blurred national boundaries, the loss of identity and strengthening of the power of multinational companies? But then the dream of a united Europe is really a utopia, and we will see its collapse as we once saw the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Perhaps British citizens simply made a mistake, not fully understanding all the consequences of their decision. That is why attempts are being made to rectify the situation by holding a second referendum, a petition for which already contains the required number of signatures. There are speculations that the Scottish Parliament may impose a veto on the UK's exit from the EU. Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said that she would urge her colleagues to do so. Her Majesty the Queen may also exercise her right not to sign the law passed by the Parliament as being "contrary to the national interests of the United Kingdom".

Is it possible that someone's covert financial game is in progress? Bloomberg estimated that the world's 400 richest people lost 127.4bn dollars over one day due to Brexit. The biggest losses were sustained by Spanish businessman Amancio Ortega, the founder of Inditex, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Amazon head Jeff Bezos. On Friday, 24 June, US stocks showed the most significant drop in 10 months. On the other hand, according to some media reports, American billionaire George Soros has managed to make a lot of money at the fall of the pound, and not for the first time at that.

Nobody knows for sure in what way the UK would break up with a large European family. It is believed that this process may take as long as two years, possibly longer. All this presupposes rather troubled times in European politics. Great Britain is likely to expect interesting developments in domestic politics. But the European Union is in even more need for changes - structural, ideological, authoritative. Otherwise, the grand European project may result in a failure. The issue of whether it would be a step towards the creation of a "European superpower" or, conversely, Brussels would weaken its control over the EU member states will be addressed at different levels. What is happening also means that we can hardly expect a rapprochement between the European Union and such countries as Turkey and Ukraine in the near future, and this fundamentally changes many current philosophies of international politics.