On the morning of the 24th of June the British electorate woke up to a reality whose potential immediate consequences had been well predicted yet generally ignored. Within only 48 hours of the referendum results being published, the sterling dropped record lows, stock markets slided and investors began freezing investments. George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer, has now announced the need for cuts to public spending and further austerity measures to deal with these pressures.The country has equally plunged into a political strife, faced with the potential rupture of the United Kingdom – as Scotland and Northern Ireland, unlikely to accept leaving the EU against their will,  may be forced to consider their own independence referendum- and a fractured government with no clear agenda to steer the country out of  this self-inflicted crisis.

 

 

Only two weeks have passed and the main architects of the referendum have already abandoned the electorate.  Prime minister David Cameron, who initially decided to call the referendum as a way to apease divisions within his party, was the first to step down, a move he had pledged not to do irrespective of the polling results. He was then followed by Boris Johnson, former Mayor of London, who announced he will no longer stand for the Conservative leadership tender despite having being the main figure behind the Vote Leave campaign. Likewise, Nigel Farage, head of the far-right UKIP party and spokesman of the populist Leave EU campaign has also stepped down, claiming “he wants his life back”.

 

 

The Conservative party now finds itself with the big task of leading negotiations most MPs did not support. A contest is due, and until a new representative is elected, the government will likely postpone discussing what the results mean for the UK’s future relationship with the EU. In the meantime, uncertainty and dispair reign amongst EU nationals living in the UK  (many of whom have also been victims of racial discrimination), UK expats in the EU and the future generations who will bear the burden of a decision they did not make.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At a time when trust towards the establishment has eroded,  one would have expected the main oppositional party to have gained strength and present the British public with a compelling alternative. However, the parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) instead finds itself within an internal battle to overthrow its leader Jeremy Corbyn, as shadow MPs have given him a no-confidence claiming he is unfit to lead the party. Corbyn refuses to step down, as he was democratically elected only nine months ago. The party is now in the midst of negotiations to broker a deal with him and the Unions, who represent his largest base of support. As of yet, anti-Corbyn members have not indicated who they want as subsitute, nor what sort of trade agreement they would pursue.

 

Beyond its current leadership battle, however, Labour faces an ideological challenge that was present well before the referendum. The fact that the party chose to implode now should be considered merely a breaking point.  Irrespective of who fills the role, Labour currently struggles to rebrand itself as a modern, socially democratic alternative. On the one side, departing from its Blairite centre-right heritage has not been an easy job. Before Corbyn, Labour lost a considerable share of its electorate who consider the party’s style to be too consensual. The leader’s current supporters, especially the young, believe issues where Labour had previously failed them, such as austerity, education and foreign policy, have been successfully brought back to the agenda under him.

 

However, the current crisis also stems from the reluctance of a majority of its MPs to identify with ideas of the old left that Corbyn resonates with. During his Remain campaign, Corbyn revealed a lack of enthusiasm towards the EU, a position he developed during the Union’s Thatcherite era – when protectionist anti-EU movements represented a legitimate, concerted effort to protect workers from the dire effects of early neoliberal policies. Thus, his attempts towards making the modern case for remaining in the EU were tainted by this legacy. This in turn allowed right-wing populist forces like UKIP to bring passions back into politics and represent the only channel through which the worries of the economically marginalised were addressed.  Although UKIP’s rhetoric was xenophobic and simplistic, it was able to tap into the shared resentment amongst lower skilled workers towards globalization and was able to convince them that leaving the EU and stopping immigration is the only way to take back control.

 

 

The only other discourse surrounding Brexit was led by the centre-right Tories, who tried to inundate the public with grim statistics on the economic consequences of not having access to the single market. However, most Leave supporters came to the conclusion that this represented a “scaremongering” tactic led by an elite trying to protect big businesses. The social and positive aspects of staying, which arguably could have been filled by Labour, were absent throughout the conversation. Thus, Labour not only failed to address current concerns regarding the EU, but it never made the case that if Britain wants to tackle the Union’s systemic loops, as well as other pressing global challenges, it benefits from sitting at the table. This seemed to be better understood by Corbyn’s younger supporters, who voted mostly to remain, but who could hardly identify their party’s position on the issue.

 

 

The conclusion to make is that overall the Brexit debate was led by different fractions of the right, with the Left having little to no role in steering the wheel. The Left acted as a consensual,  non-revolutionary force throughout, showing apathy towards both the positive and negative claims of each camp. This unveils an overall displacement of the Labour party as a compelling political force, which can be interpreted as either a tragedy or a wake-up call.In order to present itself as a relevant alternative, Labour needs to articulate a new mandate that addresses the needs of both the disenfranchised working class and a younger modern electorate whose future is at stake. In this particular case, the party will have to start discussing how it will address growing concerns over the drawbacks of liberalization,  whilst simultaneously recognise  the advantages that labour mobility and political cooperation bring in an interdependent world.

 

 

The lessons of Brexit for the European Left are twofold: on the one side,  this referendum has  illustrated that social discontent can have dramatic consequences if ignored for too long. Many political commentators have long acknowledged the public’s growing distrust towards the EU’s institutions and governments’ inability to protect local economies,  but few imagined this would culminate into a powerful political force. As other far right populists across the continent expect to build momentum from this, the European left has the responsibility to provide a stronger venue. Too many voters have heard of the democratic deficit lingering in the Union and few have had the opportunity to envisage an alternative. Whether the British Left will be able to break free from its ideological impasse or sink into oblivion is up to its leaders.