This free course sets the experience of Brexit in the context of the UK. It first analyses Brexit as a symptom of the political, economic and social geography of the UK, focusing on its uneven development in a country increasingly dominated by London and the South East of England. It then considers how the divisions within the UK (within England as well as between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland) were reflected in the voting patterns of the 2016 referendum. Finally, the course reflects on the implications of these short-term and long-term trends for the UK’s future as a multinational state.
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From Brexit to the break-up of Britain?
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This free course, From Brexit to the Break-up of Britain?, is focused on the 2016 referendum vote on membership of the European Union. It aims to do so in ways that go beyond the familiar debates over whether the outcome was right or wrong. Instead it focuses on what the vote has to tell us about the United Kingdom and its future.In the 23 June 2016 referendum, London recorded the largest pro-EU majority among English regions (59.9%) and the South-East the smallest pro-Brexit majority (51.8%...
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A referendum on the UK’s membership of the European Union (EU) was held on 23 June 2016 and 52% of those who voted recorded a vote to leave, while 48% voted for the UK to remain a member. The result came as a shock to governing elites both in the UK and in Europe and it led to the resignation of the previously unassailable Prime Minister, David Cameron, and his Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne. They both also soon stood down as MPs. Political debate around the nature of the...
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The maps you looked at in Week 1 offered a snapshot of political divisions in the UK in June 2016. A related group of maps could be generated from any set of voting results – such as the general election which took place in June 2017, or any other general election. But the picture given by the 2016 vote is particularly stark, perhaps because it was a referendum in which there were only two choices.The question is, however, whether the divisions revealed by the maps have anything more t...
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In many respects the UK still has a highly centralised social, economic and even political geography, with London (or the wider London city region) at its core, even if its political centrality is increasingly challenged by the existence of elected institutions in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The referendum vote and the consequences of Brexit highlight some of the tensions between London not only across the UK, but also specifically within England. This week, rather than taking Lond...
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It is possible to read the maps which you explored in Week 1 through the lens of the UK’s constitutional fix, and the uneasy ways in which England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales are brought together in a single governmental territory. Indeed, discussion of the break-up of Britain is usually approached through a consideration of the challenge presented by the rise of a range of nationalisms in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, and – more recently – England. As the...
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