The Russian tricolour is raised over Moscow on 1 December, 1991. Photo: Valentin Kuzmin / ITAR-TASS. Some rights reserved.The feeling of overwhelming emptiness and despair I have experienced since the result of the UK’s vote to leave the European Union seems to be shared by pretty much all of my Facebook friends (especially the British ones) and, if the anti-Brexit media are anything to go by, a huge portion of those who supported staying in the EU. The decision to leave has had an immediate impact on financial markets, which were confident of a different outcome even after the polls closed. But the most depressing aspect is that the grounds on which this hugely consequential decision were made are looking more and more spurious.
One by one, the leaders of the pro-Leave campaign and the politicians likely to take us out of the EU have disowned the promises made in the campaign, especially on immigration and freedom of movement, but also on basic economic prospects. Leading pro-Brexit politicians have admitted that they have no plan for what follows Brexit. And tales of Leave voters regretting their votes, claiming not to have misunderstood the issues, or to have cast a protest vote in the firm belief that Leave would not win, may not be sufficient to account for the margin of victory. Nevertheless, they contribute to the general feeling that this is a case of democracy going terribly wrong.
One phrase springs immediately to mind to describe the situation: “historic mistake”. The phrase, of course, was used by Russian President Vladimir Putin during the 2014 annexation of Crimea to describe the consequences of the 1991 break-up of the Soviet Union.
