Eternal Friends or Jubilant Brexiteers? The Impact of Brexit on UK MEPs' Parliamentary Work in the European Parliament

Abstract

AbstractThe aim of this article is to analyse the impact of Brexit on UK MEPs' parliamentary work in the European Parliament. The UK MEPs enjoyed full rights of MEPs, yet Brexit made their terms short and fixed. Furthermore, the Brexit process constituted a highly emotionally charged moment for politicians' parliamentary work. The article is based on a unique dataset of 130 MEP and political staff interviews and a parliamentary ethnography conducted in Brussels and Strasbourg in 2018–2020 at the time of Brexit. The empirical findings include the identification of four ways that MEPs and staff constructed the work of the outgoing UK MEPs: The Full MEP; The Scrupulous Brexit Scrutineer; The Eternal Friend; and The Jubilant Brexiteer. The empirical analysis provides a rich and nuanced account of the UK MEPs' parliamentary work differentiated by their political party and political group background.