The meaning of Brexit
Larry Elliott’s article The age of disintegration (1 July) correctly states that Brexit “was a protest against the economic model that has been in place for the past three decades”. Yet this is not the same as his central argument – that Brexit is a rejection of all globalisation. It is clear that neoliberal globalisation – characterised by the free movement of capital and the undermining of the ability of nation-states to protect their vulnerable from what is effectively vulture capitalism – has been completely rejected by British voters.
Globalisation is more than this. It is about connectedness, an exchange of ideas and a transfusion of cultures. Unfortunately, the failure of the establishment to address decreased living standards over the past three decades across the entire western world has resulted in the scapegoating of institutions and foreigners. Communities have been divided and different ethnicities turned against each other, to the point that it threatens to undermine the western liberal order.
There is hope, however. If we can create a new economic, social and environmental model that protects the vulnerable and gives genuine opportunity – rather than continued stagnation – to the so-called squeezed middle, than we can elevate our society beyond scapegoating and xenophobia. I do not think the British deliberately voted to turn their back on the world, not given their multicultural society and international history. They just perceived no other way to protect themselves within the current neoliberal economic model.
Britain narrowly rejected a debunked neoliberal globalisation peddled by an increasingly illegitimate establishment, but not globalisation itself.
Brendan Madley
Hamilton, New Zealand
• Brexit is important as a symptom, but is not the cause of our economic and social turmoil locally and globally. We are in the midst of not simply disintegration but a ongoing structural crisis in the capitalist world economy driven by the decline of the US and rise of China, along with a gathering ecological crisis threatening the planet.
The accumulating failure of the central bank-driven austerity policies of the last 30 years to restore employment and prosperity – let alone equity and sustainability – is now evident.
Unfortunately, the dominant policy elites continue to dream of austerity-based solutions or at best of merely stabilising or civilising capitalism. Meanwhile, capitalism continues to pursue endless growth and wealth accumulation based primarily on extending its exploitation of labour and nature.
Until structural changes to capitalism are implemented, we will continue to have increasing symptoms of economic and social turmoil driven by an intensifying crisis of capitalism and an increasingly threatened planet. Welcome to the rest of the century.
Stewart Sweeney
Adelaide, South Australia
• Andrew Rawnsley is right: the Brexit vote was as much about generation as it was about class. And, for British and continental European young people, tragically so (1 July).
Their anger is not surprising. These youngsters will have been schooled in the ideals of cooperation and unity that underpin the EU. They will have learnt in history lessons of a progression, in what is now Europe, from a primitive, very localised and highly contentious social organisation to a more developed, and still very contentious, society organised into modern nation-states.
They will be aware that, prior to the EU, the only European unity that existed across national boundaries was that imposed by military force – under Napoleon, and later Hitler, for example. The post-1945 ideal of a peaceful unity following the unspeakable barbarity of two world wars was a truly noble one, and represents in young minds today the secure state of affairs they have grown up with.
Now that ideal has been thrown into serious doubt and their anxiety over it is entirely understandable.
Terry Hewton
Adelaide, South Australia
• In voting for Brexit, it seems that a majority of the British public have forgotten the very wise words of Albert Einstein: “Anybody who really wants to abolish war must resolutely declare himself in favour of his own country’s resigning a portion of its sovereignty in favour of international institutions: he must be ready to make his own country amenable, in case of a dispute, to the award of an international court.”
Michael Hanne
Warkworth, New Zealand
• From this distance it always seemed unconstitutional to have a referendum supposedly binding on the democratically elected parliament. But now that the remain prime minister has not remained, it will remain to his successor to make the move to leave the EU by invoking article 50 of the treaty. If that successor should deem it in the UK’s interest to remain, may we still expect the nation to remain as a whole, not just Scotland? Would the EU then finally lose patience with the UK?
Ren Kempthorne
Nelson, New Zealand
• My wife and I have lived in Germany for many years. We were lucky enough to see this unbelievable event, Brexit, coming, and so in 2012 we took out German nationality – thank God! Germany has been very good to us, first as an employee, and later as a pensioner.
The main direct advantages for us are the ability to travel almost anywhere within mainland Europe (Schengen) and to pay with just one currency, the euro.
If this 52% leave figure is a true reflection of British society in 2016, then for us it shows how different the mainland Europeans think from the islanders.
This is a tragedy for Europe, and an unmitigated disaster for the UK.
Chris Barber
Ulm, Germany
• There surely must be a constitutional basis for a legal action by British citizens living in a EU country other than the UK, who were not allowed to vote in the referendum, although are directly involved in the consequences of any resulting action.
Gordon Hall
Weinheim, Germany
The threat of conformity
Tom Vanderbilt’s feature on The secret of taste: why we like the things we like (1 July) depicts our hapless selves as prey to changing tastes and trends, indiscriminately mimicking what is “popular”. This is yet another take on Doris Lessing’s classic essay, Prisons We Choose to Live Inside, which warned us of the dangers inherent in group thinking.
Vanderbilt adds that besides “novelty” we also like “familiarity”; that along with the “hipster effect” we also favour conformity; and so on. If this is part of “an evolutionary adaptive strategy”, as he hopefully suggests, than we still have a long way to go, now that the internet and social media threaten to make us all think alike, by selecting what’s best to pay our limited attention to.
In fact, Vanderbilt ends his essay with: “Social imitation has got easier, faster, and more volatile.” What an ominous threat to our intelligence, as so many, especially the young, lose their ability to discriminate and ultimately think for themselves.
Richard Orlando
Westmount, Quebec, Canada
Briefly
• You state that the killings in Orlando were the “worst mass shooting in US history” (17 June). Several mass shootings could be considered to be worse: the Wounded Knee Massacre, in which at least 150 Lakota were shot dead with 51 wounded; the Sand Creek Massacre, in which an estimated 70-163 Native Americans were killed; the Battle of Blair Mountain, in which 50-100 coal miners were killed. Granted, these were not examples with a lone killer, but the numbers speak for themselves.
Diana Smith
Arlington, Virginia, US
• Living in refugee limbo is no life (1 July). Manus Island and Nauru are a case of nimbyism gone awry; it seems inappropriate for Australia to keep offshore detention colonies. Will we next see decommissioned container-ships anchored offshore as housing?
R M Fransson
Wheat Ridge, Colorado, US
• Manchester authorities have found “high-strength ecstasy pills” containing “double or even triple doses” (24 June). Does this imply that the British Pharmacopoeia now contains a standard dose for E?
Anthony Walter
Surrey, British Columbia, Canada
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