EU Policies and Priorities in a Post-Brexit Era

Abstract

This chapter looks at the possible impacts of Brexit on specific European Union (EU) policies and priorities. It concludes that there are unlikely to be fundamental shifts. Policy areas such as development of the single market (notably the digital single market), further progress on the capital markets and banking unions, on the energy union and on fighting climate change, will continue to have broad support. Defence cooperation will be given a higher emphasis than before. Divisions will remain, however, in many areas, including the general direction of macro-economic policy, the approximation of taxation, the extent of EU solidarity, practical measures to distribute the burden of migration, and the nature of EU foreign policy—in particular in its Eastern Neighbourhood, the Middle East and the Mediterranean.