UK Politics: Unboldy Go There Where No Country Has Gone Before

[Which Tyler]

Not looking forward to tomorrow. Just got asked " When are you planning on ducking off then?" 

 

My day does not feel brightened by the encounter!

[Rippounet]

5 hours ago, Heartofice said:

All the lies about leavers

Yeah...

Quote

Leavers were not stupid. They could see that the failure of their elected representatives to control immigration was not simply because of a widening gap in the values of the rulers and the ruled. There was a deeper and more troubling realisation. Their leaders no longer could control who was coming in and out.

This is false, or misleading at least. There were several measures that the UK could have done to control immigration even within the EU. Not to mention the fact that for better or worse other European countries are showing that it's quite possible to fight the EU on this from the inside.

To claim that British leaders "could [not] control who was coming in and out" is an exaggeration at the very least.

As for this:

Quote

These requests, in turn, were rooted in things that have long lain at the core of what it means to be British: respect for judicial independence and the common law; a strong emphasis on the need for political accountability; a rich, proud and uninterrupted tradition of parliamentary democracy; an instinctive suspicion of the centralisation of power; a vibrant civic culture; a strong attachment to both little and national platoons.

Every single European country could write a comparable paragraph.

And I think contrary to what can be said, everyone understands what Brexit is about: how much you value the imaginary community you live in and/or which imaginary community you want to favor. It's well understood that leavers were more attached to "Britain" and "British values" than remainers. That's not an evil in itself but with the huge threat of climate change this is a time when people should really be more concerned about the survival of our societies (including their lofty values) than purely national interests. It's worrying that a country as developed as Britain would"opt out" of a trans-national project at this point, because if Britons cannot find it in themselves to promote their values through international collaboration, then who will?
Part of why there are so many dire projections for Britain is precisely because many people want nationalism to fail. Not necessarily because they look down on national values or because they support the international world order as it is, but simply because they fear nationalism is more likely to lead to conflict instead of collaboration in the future. And given the historical record I don't see how anyone could argue that they're wrong.

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

8 hours ago, Liffguard said:

I like how that article basically admits that Brexit was fundamentally about nationalist identity politics, but tries to paint that as a good thing.

Both in your country and mine. What’s occurring is happening because fragile white people cannot handle the browning of our countries. It’s always been about race, or “culture” as they like to say.

[Platypus Rex]

15 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

Why would you say that? We think its inevitable, but nobody actively wants to be fucked. 

Okay then.  If that's the case, are y'all prepared for the possibility of a pleasant surprise?  Assuming that happens, will it change any minds here?  Me, I don' t know, because I can't tell the future.

[BigFatCoward]

1 hour ago, Platypus Rex said:

Okay then.  If that's the case, are y'all prepared for the possibility of a pleasant surprise?  Assuming that happens, will it change any minds here?  Me, I don' t know, because I can't tell the future.

If every reputable economist on earth is proven wrong I'll eat my own ass. 

[Platypus Rex]

33 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said:

If every reputable economist on earth is proven wrong I'll eat my own ass. 

LOL.   No True Scotsman, again.   I guess economists who disagree are the disreputable ones.  I really don't expect to watch you eat your own ass, so I guess that answers my question.  It's impossible for you to be proven wrong by any contingency.

[kuenjato]

2 hours ago, Platypus Rex said:

Okay then.  If that's the case, are y'all prepared for the possibility of a pleasant surprise?  Assuming that happens, will it change any minds here?  Me, I don' t know, because I can't tell the future.

What sort of "pleasant surprise" do you think would entail? 

[Platypus Rex]

1 hour ago, kuenjato said:

What sort of "pleasant surprise" do you think would entail? 

An improved UK economy (post Brexit).  Would that make you happy?  Or miserable?

[The Anti-Targ]

An improved UK economy post Brexit is a much greater example of wishful thinking than predicting a depressed economy. What part of the economy is improved by Brexit? At best some parts of the economy are unaffected by Brexit, but some parts of the economy are harmed by it. So there's little objective evidence to suggest things will be better.

And apparently the lies that have been told about leavers is that despite what leavers say that remainers think leavers thought it was all about the economy, actually it was, to the apparent astonishment of remainers, about identity. Though it seems now leavers are all about being rosy about how things are going to be all great for the economy.

 

 

[DaveSumm]

5 hours ago, Platypus Rex said:

An improved UK economy (post Brexit).  Would that make you happy?  Or miserable?

Improvement can only be measured against where it would have been had we stayed, which is a murky question at best.

[Heartofice]

18 hours ago, Rippounet said:

This is false, or misleading at least. There were several measures that the UK could have done to control immigration even within the EU. Not to mention the fact that for better or worse other European countries are showing that it's quite possible to fight the EU on this from the inside.

To claim that British leaders "could [not] control who was coming in and out" is an exaggeration at the very least

Are you talking about the EU ability to eject migrants if they aren't working or are self sufficient? That's one control we could surely use, well except that the vast majority of EU  migrants come here either already with jobs lined up or find work quite quickly, so it's effect would have been severely limited.  I don't find that argument very compelling.

18 hours ago, Rippounet said:

And I think contrary to what can be said, everyone understands what Brexit is about: how much you value the imaginary community you live in and/or which imaginary community you want to favor.

Agree that a lot of it is about attachment to a national identity and sense of community. I don't believe there is anything inherently evil or wrong in that. The problem has been when some tend to underestimate or denigrate people's sense of attachment to a national identity (only if some cases however, it doesn't seem to apply to the Scottish or the Welsh for instance) 

Quote

It's worrying that a country as developed as Britain would"opt out" of a trans-national project at this point, because if Britons cannot find it in themselves to promote their values through international collaboration, then who will?

Why would Brexit mean that Britain doesn't want to co-operate with the rest of the world on climate change. A very strange statement if you ask me. Why is it necessary to be part of a supra-national, potentially federal organisation in order to collaborate with other countries? 

18 hours ago, Rippounet said:

Part of why there are so many dire projections for Britain is precisely because many people want nationalism to fail. Not necessarily because they look down on national values or because they support the international world order as it is, but simply because they fear nationalism is more likely to lead to conflict instead of collaboration in the future. And given the historical record I don't see how anyone could argue that they're wrong.

I dunno about that, firstly just because you don't want to hand over controls of your country to a large external body doesn't mean you are going to be going to war with anyone. You could also make the argument that Religion and Empire are bigger problems when it comes to wars... and well the EU is becoming more of an Empire than anything else. 

[Rippounet]

11 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Are you talking about the EU ability to eject migrants if they aren't working or are self sufficient? That's one control we could surely use, well except that the vast majority of EU  migrants come here either already with jobs lined up or find work quite quickly, so it's effect would have been severely limited.  I don't find that argument very compelling.

With all due respect opinion is not relevant here. Figures from various EU member states show that immigration can be controled and almost reduced to a trickle. It's also a fact that British leaders did not try to do that and instead used the issue to fuel euroscepticism.

11 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Why would Brexit mean that Britain doesn't want to co-operate with the rest of the world on climate change. A very strange statement if you ask me. Why is it necessary to be part of a supra-national, potentially federal organisation in order to collaborate with other countries?

It's not so much about belonging to supra-national organisations than about the compromises that supra-national collaboration entails.
You don't need a supra-national organisation to collaborate with other countries, but if you can't do it within one there's no reason to think you'll manage without it.

Also, climate change will considerably increase the number of refugees in the next decades. Sooner or later countries working together on the issue will have to consider taking in a great number of climate refugees. One can now doubt that Britons will be willing to do that. And if Britons aren't, who will be? Not the Poles or the Hungarians that's for sure. The French and the Dutch are struggling with xenophobia as well, not to mention Italians. Even Nordic states like Sweden are hardly as open as they once were.
Point is, Brexit is a symptom of a far greater problem and it really doesn't bode well for the future.

11 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

I dunno about that, firstly just because you don't want to hand over controls of your country to a large external body doesn't mean you are going to be going to war with anyone.

It's a slippery-slope fallacy. However, with climate change we no longer need to go to war to destroy one another. Even without actual conflict, lack of collaboration should be enough to devastate our societies.

[SeanF]

On 1/31/2020 at 9:48 AM, The Marquis de Leech said:

Had Britain joined the Euro, 2008-2009 would have been far worse, potentially leading to a forced Brexit a decade earlier, and Tony Blair being lynched.

This Brexit was the product of David Cameron making a promise he never thought he'd need to keep.

It's certainly possible that British membership of the single currency could have blown the whole thing up.  The UK economy is too large to be bailed out.

[Heartofice]

5 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

With all due respect opinion is not relevant here. Figures from various EU member states show that immigration can be controled and almost reduced to a trickle. It's also a fact that British leaders did not try to do that and instead used the issue to fuel euroscepticism.

Which large western states reduced immigration to a trickle?

5 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

It's not so much about belonging to supra-national organisations than about the compromises that supra-national collaboration entails.
You don't need a supra-national organisation to collaborate with other countries, but if you can't do it within one there's no reason to think you'll manage without it.

Clearly Britain has been collaborating on a wide array of issues, so its rather obtuse to claim it hasn't. I'm still not seeing any reason why leaving the EU would make any material difference to global collaboration, in many respects it could lead to a far more global and joined up approach.

9 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

It's a slippery-slope fallacy. However, with climate change we no longer need to go to war to destroy one another. Even without actual conflict, lack of collaboration should be enough to devastate our societies.

Doesn't really answer my point but ok.

[SeanF]

5 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

An improved UK economy post Brexit is a much greater example of wishful thinking than predicting a depressed economy. What part of the economy is improved by Brexit? At best some parts of the economy are unaffected by Brexit, but some parts of the economy are harmed by it. So there's little objective evidence to suggest things will be better.

And apparently the lies that have been told about leavers is that despite what leavers say that remainers think leavers thought it was all about the economy, actually it was, to the apparent astonishment of remainers, about identity. Though it seems now leavers are all about being rosy about how things are going to be all great for the economy.

 

 

The UK has a huge trade deficit with the EU member states . Post Brexit, one would expect the losers would be those businesses that are dependent on exports to the EU;  the gainers would be those businesses that gain domestic market share as imports from the EU decline.

[mormont]

7 minutes ago, SeanF said:

The UK has a huge trade deficit with the EU member states . Post Brexit, one would expect the losers would be those businesses that are dependent on exports to the EU;  the gainers would be those businesses that gain domestic market share as imports from the EU decline.

This assumes that the UK economy has the capacity to increase domestic production of these goods. In most cases, it does not, and likely can't develop that capacity. So we will have to buy the goods at a premium from the EU or other places.

[A wilding]

An improved UK economy is possible - just further reduce workers rights and consumer protections (no EU limitations on doing that now); further reduce spending on the welfare state; and finally ensure downwards pressure on wages by allowing immigration as needed to prevent skill shortages for all jobs down to about 25K/year (as per that recent report and Priti Patel's ideas).

[SeanF]

19 minutes ago, mormont said:

This assumes that the UK economy has the capacity to increase domestic production of these goods. In most cases, it does not, and likely can't develop that capacity. So we will have to buy the goods at a premium from the EU or other places.

But, it would provide a business opportunity for those wishing to produce such goods and services. IMHO, the Single Market proved a good deal more beneficial for people wanting to sell into this country, than to people wanting to export from this country.  The UK's trading performance with countries that are not part of the Single Market (where we have a trade surplus overall) is a good deal better.

[Rippounet]

5 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Doesn't really answer my point but ok.

I said conflict and you read war. Large wars are unlikely. Conflicts otoh happen all the time, and can have important consequences.

5 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Clearly Britain has been collaborating on a wide array of issues, so its rather obtuse to claim it hasn't. I'm still not seeing any reason why leaving the EU would make any material difference to global collaboration, in many respects it could lead to a far more global and joined up approach.

That is the crux of our disagreement.

Nationalism is inherently competitive. It's possible to have a respectful and fruitful collaboration on issues when it's mutually beneficial, because many issues do not translate into zero-sum games. So of course it's always possible for nations to collaborate in many ways.
In the context of a global environmental crisis however, many issues will in fact turn out to be zero-sum games, even when they don't have to be, because fighting climate change is directly linked to resource management and it's extremely difficult for nations to agree on the sacrifices each one has to make. That's where we're at right now, with no large nation really taking the lead.

But even without the environmental crisis in the picture nations still compete for resources because that is how the global economy is structured. To be clear, within the global socio-economic structure nations compete for investment and the development of means of production. They do it by reducing taxes, especially corporate and financial taxes. Even within the EU nations do just that (that's how Ireland developed its economy).
As far as the British economy is concerned it's widely expected that the UK will now "compete" with the EU as a whole and lower its corporate and financial taxes to attract international corporations and investment. The consequences of this are twofold. First, it makes funding of welfare programs (such as the NHS) far more difficult for everyone. Second it fuels the very forces that are responsible for climate change in the first place.

Very few people believe that there will be a "far more global and joined up approach" on anything in Europe outside the European Union. Quite honestly I think the "Europe of nations" envisioned by Brexiteers is a pipedream. Instead the best analyses I've read make suggestions to reform the EU so that it can be more efficient and more democratic in order to adequatly face future challenges.
So to me the real question is whether Brexit will help or hinder potential reforms of the EU. And it's too soon to tell at the moment.

5 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Which large western states reduced immigration to a trickle?

Are Poland and Hungary large enough for you?
Also, France's net migration figures (i.e. migratory balance) ae now officially lower than 50,000/year (have been for the last three years at least), or under 0,1% of the population. This is of course counter-intuitive because people focus on second or third (or fourth, or fifth...) -generation immigrants who are not actual immigrants. In other words, xenophobia is fueled by a demographic evolution that is now happening independently from immigration itself. That's why the whole debate on "immigration" in many Western countries is fatally flawed from the start.

[Heartofice]

Haven’t got a lot of time to respond as I’m just going out, but I said large western states, so Poland and Hungary hardly count. In fact everyone was leaving Poland for the Uk in order to find better paying jobs. No idea why you would think that was a good example. 
Plus they have experienced large levels of economic migration recently from Ukraine so again, pretty bad example.

Do you have any actually have any examples over the last 10-15 years of Western European state’s ( let’s stick to countries with a decent economy yeah) where immigration  has been ‘ a trickle’

 

if you could try and tie it into your theory about ability to limit immigration by the powers i mentioned it would be helpful.

Also on the nationalism point, my argument is really that building bigger blocks of power doesn’t necessarily lead to less disagreement. There will always be competition between states, whether that’s Britain and France or the Eu and China I’m not sure that is going away