Lessons from Brexit and a Social Europe

The re­sults of the UK par­lia­men­tary elec­tions in 2019 - which gave an over­whelm­ing ma­jor­ity to the Con­ser­v­a­tive Party - have been in­ter­preted in many ways. A lot of analy­sis has fo­cused on ex­plain­ing why re­gions in the north and cen­tre of the United King­dom - which for the most part of the last cen­tury voted for the Labour party - had sud­denly swung con­ser­v­a­tive. While many have pointed to the im­por­tance of na­tion­al­ist sen­ti­ments and a nos­tal­gia to­wards the for­mer British em­pire, there is one fac­tor that has not been em­pha­sised enough; large un­em­ploy­ment rates and the lack of ad­e­quate labour stan­dards.

Start­ing in the 1980s, pro­pelled first by Mar­garet Thatcher and later by Tony Blair, the UK’s eco­nomic sys­tem started to move away from one based on heavy in­dus­try to one based on ser­vices con­cen­trated in the City of Lon­don. As a re­sult of this shift, fac­to­ries closed, and un­em­ploy­ment rose. In the 2000s, these re­gions be­came home to dis­tri­b­u­tion cen­tres of large com­pa­nies pro­vid­ing hope of eco­nomic re­gen­er­a­tion and the re­turn of dig­ni­fied em­ploy­ment. In­stead of meet­ing these ex­pec­ta­tions, they were faced with the cur­rent re­al­ity of a global econ­omy dom­i­nated by large multi­na­tional cor­po­ra­tions. For the work­ing class, this meant in­se­cure em­ploy­ment, long hours, and low pay. It also meant work­places where all their move­ments were con­trolled and where breaks were so short work­ers found them­selves forced to re­main at their sta­tions and uri­nate in plas­tic bot­tles. Many re­fused to work at such cen­tres, long­ing for a past in which they had jobs they were proud to main­tain. Be­tween 2004 and 2007, ten coun­tries from Cen­tral and East­ern Eu­rope ac­ceded to the Eu­ro­pean Union, and many of these jobs were taken up by im­mi­grants com­ing from these new mem­ber states.

Peo­ple in these re­gions, un­em­ployed or in jobs de­void of any dig­nity, did not be­lieve the politi­cians and econ­o­mists who dur­ing the cam­paign be­fore the Brexit vote said that stay­ing in the Eu­ro­pean Union was es­sen­tial to main­tain eco­nomic growth. These peo­ple did not be­lieve ex­perts be­cause they ei­ther did not see any ev­i­dence of this growth or did not ex­pe­ri­ence any tan­gi­ble ben­e­fits of this sup­posed growth.

This all points to one cru­cial les­son that the EU must take on board: the im­por­tance of de­vel­op­ing a So­cial Eu­rope. If the EU could pre­vent the abuse of work­ers on the part of large com­pa­nies and al­le­vi­ate job in­se­cu­rity, peo­ple liv­ing in im­pov­er­ished areas would not use such bal­lots to ex­press their dis­con­tent with their eco­nomic sit­u­a­tion. Fur­ther­more, es­tab­lish­ing rules and prac­tices at the Eu­ro­pean level in­stead of the na­tional level would elim­i­nate the in­cen­tives of these com­pa­nies to es­tab­lish them­selves in other mem­ber states where there are lower labour stan­dards. Cit­i­zens re­sid­ing in coun­tries like Poland and Ro­ma­nia as well as those who have im­mi­grated to other mem­ber states would ben­e­fit equally from these pro­tec­tions.

What is at stake is noth­ing less than the in­tegrity and sur­vival of the EU. If cit­i­zens do not feel se­cure in their so­cial and eco­nomic sys­tem, they will not want to re­main part of an in­sti­tu­tion whose main ac­com­plish­ment has been the cre­ation of an in­ter­nal mar­ket, but whose so­cial pol­icy ac­com­plish­ments leave much to be de­sired.

The new pres­i­dency of the Eu­ro­pean Com­mis­sion has the op­por­tu­nity to change the course taken by the Eu­ro­pean Union so far and do more to pri­ori­tise the pro­tec­tion and de­vel­op­ment oflabour and so­cial rights.

OPIN­ION