Reporting from the frontline of Brexit Wonderland is not easy. At the beginning of last week, it looked as though prime Minister Theresa May’s government might collapse because she couldn’t gain agreement on a “soft” border with Ireland, preventing further negotiations to withdraw from the European Union. But then, after talks through Thursday night with the Irish government, the Unionist D.U.P. in Northern Ireland, and the E.U., she flew to Brussels and, before the sun had risen, triumphantly announced that she had clinched a deal.
Perhaps most extraordinary is that, for the most part, both sides in this agonizing debate agreed with her, which seems like a logical impossibility. The Brexiters cheered that Britain was well and truly on the way out of the E.U., while the Remainers decided that the open border meant that a part of Britain would effectively stay in the E.U.’s single market and Customs Union, which in turn would make it unlikely that the country would be forced into a hard Brexit.
Both sides could of course be right, but a victory for the U.K. this was most certainly not. The last few days established without doubt that the European Union was completely in charge of the negotiations and that any idea that Britain had taken back control with the referendum vote was utter nonsense. May gave in on all the main points. Thus, part of the U.K. effectively remains in the E.U.; the European Court of Justice will still have power over some law in Britain for a period of eight years; and, in the absence of a workable solution to the border with Ireland, “regulatory alignment” will be necessary—in other words, Britain would continue to abide by E.U. rules. She also agreed to a transition period of at least two years, and to pay the divorce bill of £35-£39 billion.
As California burns and Donald Trump sets light to the Middle East, the baffling goings on in the state formally known as Great Britain must seem irrelevant to Americans, apart from the briefly reassuring fact that there is at least one other country where populist forces have led to utterly irrational behavior. Tough challenges face the British government as it enters trade negotiations. But what is clear now is that the U.K. has gained nothing so far except an illusory self-determination, which probably only has meaning if you a Brit who easily tears up at the sight of a Union Jack, or a flyby of the few remaining World War Two Spitfires.
The great irony is that the super patriots of the Brexit movement may have accelerated the breakup of the United Kingdom. Not only is the eventual unification of Ireland now a possibility, but Scotland–where there was a majority for remaining in the E.U.—believes it, too, is entitled to the exceptions made for the Northern Irish, who will be allowed free movement within the E.U. There will be millions of Remainers all around the U.K. who will wonder why the hell they don’t have the special status of people born in Northern Ireland.
The closer you look, the crazier everything becomes. Brexit minister David Davis assured Parliament that his office carried out 58 impact reports on leaving the E.U., then admitted that they didn’t exist. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond, told a bewildered Commons committee that the split Cabinet had never even discussed what a post Brexit Britain looked like—all they wanted, in the words of the left-leaning Daily Mirror, was for the other side to lose. Brexiters have showed an astonishing ignorance about the Irish and Northern Irish, making bloopers worthy of schoolchildren. It is not even certain they know what the government has agreed to on Northern Ireland. The E.U. will now sit back and watch as the British struggle to square the circle of having an open border and leaving the customs union.
But the immediate problem for Theresa May is the prolonged, complex negotiation on trade. We know what she thinks about this because she made a speech in April 2016, before the referendum, outlining the benefits of E.U. Membership:
Let me just underline that Britain’s prime minister knows that leaving the E.U. will result in a loss of trade and the impoverishment of her country, yet is preparing to negotiate to that very end. She survived last week when few thought she would, but it is very hard to see her getting through that process, particularly as the right wing of her party, in the shape of Rupert Murdoch’s man, Environment Secretary Michael Gove, is already making threatening noises about giving the British the option of overturning the entire deal in favor of hard Brexit at a future general election.
As we know from this year’s poll, in which May did much worse than expected, outcomes of General Elections are unpredictable. The British could just as easily vote to return to the E.U., if things get really bad and they are given that option. Opinion polls are moving against Brexit and 50 percent of the electorate wants another referendum, which was unthinkable a few months ago.
My sense, for what it’s worth, is that we have a long way to go before the U.K. takes steps to reverse the Brexit vote. And this will probably only be achieved as demographics change and young voters, who are twice as likely to be pro- European, begin to replace the older voters. The May deal, crazy and illogical as it is, probably makes opposition harder, because the E.U. is sick of Britain’s behavior and is unceremoniously pushing us towards the exit. Those who oppose Brexit, meanwhile, both in and outside Parliament, have gained little traction since the referendum. The opposition is divided, has no decent leadership, lacks analytical firepower, and has never been able to find a message to counter the Brexiters’ powerful call to “take back control.”
Despite May’s jubilation at surviving a tumultuous week, nothing is resolved: in fact, things are a lot more complicated. Right now, Britain is like a patient who is receiving a blood transfusion in one arm and has slashed the veins in the other.