The 2016 referendum result was a victory for a more progressive, democratised, socially just and international-focused (as opposed to Eurocentric) vision of a future UK. The fact that no individual or party has effectively made the case for Brexit as a progressive turning point in UK political history has intermittently created an existential threat to the project. Brexit merely offers the UK an opportunity (not a certainty) of a move towards a more participatory form of inclusive democracy that seeks both social justice and global partnerships. There are still many obstacles to overcome.
Why did the liberal left not offer a progressive Brexit alternative to Boris Johnson in the December 2019 election? Why did the left allow their leave project to become submerged into the populist caricature constructed by a politically illiterate media? As Remainers quite rightly pointed out, Brexit also carried with it the danger that a UK variant of neoliberalism would become entrenched and spawn a new level of trade jingoism.

Every path to the future contains risk. Brexit allows for a broader range of future pathways. Remaining in the EU was the cautious, conservative & more predictable pathway. However, to have remained would have been to ignore the thirty year period prior to 2016 which had seen the most rapid widening of the wealth gap in the UK (https://data.oecd.org/inequality/income-inequality.htm) The vulnerable in the UK knew something was wrong. Keen observers of the EU knew that it was not what it’s advocates claimed it was. Something needed to change. Something still needs to change.

So what is the progressive argument for Brexit? Potentially Brexit creates a dynamic that leads to a more localised and participatory democracy. This democracy becomes the key driver for social & economic justice and the barrier to neoliberalism. Power moves closer to the people. Power or sovereignty is not handed over in some nebulous and unaccountable form to a supra-national body. Where did the pooled sovereignty entrusted to the EU go to? Did it rest with the European Parliament, the European Court of Justice, the Commission, the Council of Ministers, the European Central Bank or somewhere not yet identified? This lack of clarity in terms of accountability was the root of the EU’s dysfunction. It was no great surprise that the EU messed up the procurement process for the vaccines, nor that it choose to act without reference to the Republic of Ireland when using Article 16 to close the Irish border. Even more serious was the fact that the EU Commission President was not held accountable for these unmandated decisions. Plenty of people called for her to resign. No mechanisms existed for the citizens of Europe to make this happen. Any UK PM would have been forced to resign in similar circumstances. Being no longer subject to an unaccountable power as a result of Brexit is a progressive development and a cause for optimism.

Brexit has destabilised the UK political system for five years. This instability is essential as a formative stage in the gestation of progressive change and reform. Since the referendum the Irish Question, Scottish independence, the quality of our democracy & the need for greater social justice for our most vulnerable citizens have all moved centre stage. A remain victory in 2016 would have closed all of these debates down for another generation or until the EU terminally failed. Democracy has been rejuvenated by the re-realisation by the “have nots” that voting means something. This is also a progressive development because they will continue to use the vote instead of more direct action to be heard in the future.

What are the specific progressive changes & opportunities that the UK now has? Firstly, we seem to have moved closer to a one state solution on the island of Ireland. The Government of Ireland Act of 1920 created a Northern Ireland that had no basis in history, economics, geography nor politics. It is a sectarian state. The Anglo-Irish agreement of 1998 is a fig leaf that will eventually be removed. Brexit revealed this logic and will push all parties towards a graduated and progressive solution. Scotland has every right to seek independence through referendum, though there is a clear irony in a nationalist party receiving so much support from & claiming to be aligned with the EU. An independent Scotland with a democratised parliament is potentially progressive. If English, Welsh and Scottish state parliaments were part of a legislative and executive structure that included a UK Senate (replacing the House of Lords) and an elected President (replacing the monarchy) then Brexit will been the catalyst for the greatest leap forward in progressive democracy since 1918. If local and regional government were reformed at the same time create more participatory processes, then we would be looking at the most progressive period of reform in UK history.
All of the above move decision making & power closer to the people. Authority remains accountably within a geographical defined area. Some sovereignty maybe temporarily mandated into international agreements. However, this sovereignty is not permanently lost as subsequent elections might require elected governments to recover that sovereignty. A Remain victory in 2016 would have meant a permanent loss of unrecoverable sovereignty to an organisation that was committed to a degree of neoliberalism that the UK electorate have not voted for since 1987. Resisting being tied into a locked down, unreforming & unreformable neoliberal organisation was a key progressive consequence of the 2016 referendum.
Immigration was never the significant driving force behind Brexit. Many shy leavers spent the referendum campaign thinking and talking about democracy and social justice. There is a false perception that Remain was progressive, when in fact many defenders of EU viewed cheap labour from Eastern Europe was some kind of ethical policy; in fact it kept pay down in Western Europe for the most vulnerable and removed the most qualified people from the stagnant economies of Eastern Europe. Freedom of movement benefited the wealthy middle classes of Western Europe. A oft repeated Remainer trope was that eastern european immigrants were harder working & better qualified than the workers that a global immigration policy might secure. Underlying this argument is an inaccurate & ethnocentric mythology that I hope will be destroyed by a progressive global immigration policy over the next 20 years and beyond.
Why did the left fail to make a progressive case for Brexit? This is especially concerning considering the eloquent arguments put forward by Michael Foot, Tony Benn, Barbara Castle & Peter Shore in 1975. Liberal and often left of centre Leavers remained silent through the campaign because of the unpleasant possibility that they would be called stupid and racist by the political party they had voted for all their lives (e.g. Emily Thornberry). This opened up the potential that Brexit would be prevented by those believe their views to be intellectually superior and above democratic accountability. Very much like the technocrats of the EU. The attempt to prevent Brexit happening and deny the referendums mandate was Trump-like in its audacity and arrogance. The sustained attack on the legitimacy of the referendum was (ironically) reminiscent of Trump’s recent foot stomping. Trump called for insurrection; many of our wealthy citizens came close to doing the same.
At the root of the misunderstandings around Brexit is a belief that all political & trade alliances should be geographically based. Actually, the UK will benefit far more from seeking alliances globally with countries that share our desire for a progressive and ethical form of democracy. The EU is neither progressive or ethical, as has been repeatedly shown by numerous academic studies into the decline of social democratic parties across Europe. Parties that were unable to enact that investment programme they were mandated to implement by voters because of EU financial rules. Rules that are there to protect capitalist neoliberalism against democracy. Many have been fooled (understandably) by the EU’s very sophisticated use of the language of equity, civil rights and consumer rights. Neoliberalism’s ability to re-invent the Thatcherite-Reaganite right wing agenda since the late 1980s has undermined democracy by convincing well meaning liberals they are voting for something internationalist & progressive, when in fact they are voting for the most pernicious form of hyper-capitalism that has ever existed. What they perceived as ethical internationalism was in fact the globalisation of Thatcherite policies. The policies they all railed against in the 1980s and that they now embrace in a re-packaged, user-friendly format. The UK middle classes have always confused support for the EU with being europhile. You can still read Proust and purchase Taramasalata outside the EU.

Leaving the EU is not an end in itself. It is the beginning of a long journey towards an upgraded, progressive and empowering form of democracy. I am pleased that so many Remainers are finally shifting their ground. I am also pleased that we are moving away from macro organisations in which sovereignty & accountability are hidden, towards the possibility of a localised or regionalised form of participatory democracy. I am hoping for a United Ireland, an independent Scotland & Wales. The removal of the House of Lords & the monarchy. A UK senate to replace the House of Lords. An elected UK President to replace our current unelected head of state. If all this is achieved over the next thirty years then Brexit will have been the catalyst.

I am optimistic that a progressive future is possible for the UK, and this all due to Brexit. I am optimistic that there are enough progressive voices speaking out for us to begin to mitigate the class-based elitism that has smothered progressive politics in the UK for generations.
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