Ruling Divisions: The Politics of Brexit

Tim Haughton

doi:10.1017/s1537592721002267

Abstract

An abstract is not available for this content. As you have access to this content, full HTML content is provided on this page. A PDF of this content is also available in through the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Highlights

Perhaps the most surprising thing about Brexit is that we should not have been surprised at all
The fuel had been amassing for decades. All it really needed was a spark, and that was duly provided by David Cameron
In calling a referendum he struck the match that unleashed a fire whose flames forced him to flee 10 Downing Street and ushered in a period of political imbroglio in British politics characterized by leadership elections, an early general election, unusual political alliances, Supreme Court battles, long parliamentary debates, indecisive votes and humiliating defeats for the government, large-scale demonstrations, the resignation of another prime minister, the prorogation of Parliament, and yet another early general election

Summary

Book Review Essay

Brexit in History: Sovereignty or a European Union? By Beatrice Heuser. London: Hurst & Company, 2019. 304p. $30.00 cloth. Scholarship has already served up several insightful accounts from eminent political scientists of the referendum vote on June 23, 2016, helping explain to a puzzled academic community and punditocracy how its outcome could have happened. Many of these accounts focus on the vote itself, with their number crunching leading them to stress the salience of immigration and a “complex and crosscutting mix of calculations, emotions and cues” (Clarke, Goodwin, and Whiteley, 2017, 9; Curtice, 2017; Hobolt, 2016). The picture of Brexit requires analysis of its roots (sociology), the terrain (history), the nature of the central object (the referendum itself), the ideological lens through which some viewed the debate, and an understanding of the power of narratives

Identity and the Roots of Brexit

Findings

Role of the Campaign