Romancing Brexit, then and now

Romancing the idea of Brexit is quite different from 'Brexit Romance', as depicted by Clementine Beauvais in her novel

Brexit Romance, a recent novel by Clémentine Beauvais, was set up in July 2017, exactly a year after the Britons voted for Brexit — the most discussed referendum in modern history. Indeed, the islanders have been romancing the idea of divorcing Europe for quite some time, even before the marriage. Britain had joined the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1973, and immediately took a referendum on it in 1975. Nearly two-third of the people opined in favour of continuing with the EEC, so did the main political parties and the press. The EEC changed the name to European Union (EU) in 1993. So, this 1975 referendum was nothing but the first Brexit referendum, although people grossly miss its reference. Certainly, the much-discussed June 2016 referendum is the second one in this context.

Even before Britain joined the 'Common Market' of Europe, British author Daphne du Maurier had written her novel Rule Britannia in 1972, where she described that after joining the 'Common Market' Britain had taken a fictional referendum. And this resulted in Britain breaking out from the 'Common Market'.

Thus, it is safe to imagine that Britain had the desire to withdraw herself from the EU since the very beginning, possibly more than any other member state. I always wonder why Britain had so much desire to break the tie with Europe. Several researchers had projected grossly negative economic impacts of the possible break-up — on agriculture, trade, industries, job market, educational institutions — even before June 2016, yet the British romanticism with the idea of Brexit continued. Is that associated with the island’s geographical isolation? Does Britain have a different kind of national prejudice? Is it somewhat associated with their heritage of setting up colonies worldwide? Or were they afraid of so many immigrants from former colonies and also from Eastern Europe?

However, romancing the idea of Brexit is quite different from 'Brexit Romance', as depicted by Clémentine Beauvais in her novel. This is purely a post-referendum syndrome. In the sweet-bitter-sweet novel, a canny entrepreneur set up a secret start-up — the eponymous Brexit Romance — to arrange Anglo-French marriages, to match young Europhilic Brits to generous-minded French people. The objective was to obtain dual nationality, French and English, if the couple stay married for five years, and to get back the European citizenship for the Brit in the process. Beauvais draws a realistic and terribly accurate portrait of today’s youth —their willingness to trade off political concern with romantic relationships in the backdrop of an unprecedented socio-economic and cultural crisis— and a complex political climate of the UK and Europe, where marriage was seen not as a pact of love, but a contract of interest between two people sharing the same convictions. However, is a European passport so lucrative in the post-referendum Britain? Is the impact of Brexit so severe to the island? Yes, Beauvais believes so. So do many others. For example, Irish citizenship is open to Britons having Irish parents or grandparents, and there is a 22 per cent increase in the number of Britons applying for Irish passport in 2018. And requests for German citizenship from more than 3,380 British Jews have been received by the German Embassy in London since the Brexit referendum in June 2016 until January 2019, whereas only around 20 such requests were made annually in the years before Brexit.

Certainly, Brexit referendum had tremendous social and political impact — Britain has already experienced the exit of one prime minister, and another barely survived two no-confidence motions within one month. And the post-Brexit Britain will feel the tremor in every aspect of its economy over the next few years. Another recent fiction, Brexit XXL: A Political Novel, by Vincent Pluchet portrayed London in the year 2022, where Tracy Meller, the Conservative Prime Minister, is facing an unprecedented crisis. Around 2018, after a series of endless negotiations with Brussels, the prime minister had chosen the most uncompromising of all possible exits, a ‘Brexit XXL’. Subsequently, within the next four years, the economy, financial markets and job market are in pathetic condition, the morale and confidence of the country reached a new low, Britain’s control over Scotland was loosened, and the opposition Labour Party became very powerful.

Interestingly, even now, some political analysts speculate that there are looming signs that Britain may be hurtling towards a suicidal no-deal Brexit on March 29, 2019, specially after the British parliament resoundingly rejecting Theresa May’s Brexit deal on January 15. And there is little confusion that Meller in Vincent Pluchet’s novel is none other than May herself. Certainly, the author shares the view of many others, that Britain is heading towards a dystopia in near future.

On the other hand, the proposed Brexit deal is an excellent one for the EU — no more member country would possibly show interest to break the union after looking at Britain’s balance sheet in the Brexit deal. And Britain will keep on wondering why at all they wanted a break-up with Europe. Yes, they possibly could not imagine that a divorce costs so dear. In Brexit XXL, in the backdrop of 2022, Prime Minister Meller herself was starting to doubt the wisdom of her decision. Is that the end of romancing with Brexit? The dystopia of ‘Brexit Romance’, however, continues.

The writer is professor of statistics, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata