Let's be clear about this, leaving the EU may now be mainstream, but that doesn't mean it's no longer a batshit crazy idea.
— James Torrance (@TheLiberalTory) May 13, 2013
That was my perspective back in 2013, but as David Cameron's EU renegotiation reaches its climax, I'm starting to wonder whether it still holds true. The Prime Minister has largely failed. He traveled to Brussels today ready to be shut down uncompromisingly by Angela Merkel. The EU is calling Cameron's bluff, daring him to campaign for Brexit and the grand bargain he had once hoped for is not going to happen. Instead, he is scrabbling around searching for something he can sell to a country increasingly keen on leaving.
Cameron's failure is not just a political challenge for him, it is a significant challenge for those of us who would like to remain in the EU. How do we respond to the fact that, faced with the threat of Brexit, the EU has shrugged its shoulders and told us in no uncertain terms "if you're going to be like that, maybe you should just fuck off"?
The awkward conclusion I'm slowly coming to is that they might be right. We maybe, just maybe, would be better off out. But how have we arrived here? Two and a half years ago, leaving was a batshit crazy idea. How is it now something I can get my head around?
Saving the patient by removing the limb?
Worryingly, the EU is starting to get its head around it too. Herman Van Rompuy told the BBC today that the UK's departure would be "an amputation" - interesting diplomatic language. It appeals to the British ego by suggesting that the EU would feel pain from our departure but does not mean he thinks it's a bad idea. Amputation is generally good for a patient, a way to remove persistent disease. It is risky and painful, true, but the consequences are worse. The disease must be prevented from spreading. It is a surrender to the inevitable. Has Van Rompuy given up on pleasing the British?
Cameron's pathetic effort
Part of Van Rombuy's ambivalence probably stems from Britain's attitude over the last few years. The Prime Minister's attempt at a renegotiation has been lamentable. Instead of constructive engagement about the future of the EU, it has been a series of childish and parochial demands for concessions that would benefit nobody but Britain. In the face of an inevitable halt in Eurozone expansion, Cameron could have lobbied for more recognition for those left outside the club. He could have engaged eurosceptics across the continent, forming a bulwark against the pressure for ever closer union. Every member experiences irritants emanating from Brussels and many countries are concerned by the integration forced on them by crises within the Eurozone. Why is there not a deal on the table with something for everyone? Why has Britain not taken the role many of us would like it to - as a constructive leader of those states who view their future as independent nations rather than as mere cogs in a vast European hegemon? Cameron's tactics have made that impossible.
Europe's miscalculation
The early responses were dismissive. Cameron's renegotiation was not serious and should not be taken seriously. It was a sop to the right wing of his party, an attempt to use geopolitics to win internecine party wars. Even if it wasn't, until May this year it was clear that Cameron would never be able to deliver a referendum. He would either lose altogether in 2015 or be locked into another coalition with a pro-EU partner. There would be no referendum, no campaign to leave and no need for a serious renegotiation. Even if there was, this was just a niche pre-occupation of xenophobes, closet racists and howl-at-the-moon nutters. No campaign to leave would ever succeed. The British people, wise and risk-averse, would never countenance it.
I was convinced of this too, and still hope to be proved right. I saw millions of pencils hover over the 'leave' option. The frustrations with Brussels (real and imagined) would rage, pushing for Brexit. But then the fear would take hold. The businesses that would suffer, the uncertainty, the clients lost and subsidies given up would all be too much and we wouldn't take the risk. Normal service would resume.
This may not be true, however. Narrowing polls suggest a public gradually getting comfortable with leaving. The 'don't knows' may be breaking towards Brexit, even with its current inept and chaotic campaigns. Moreover, it is a mistake to see Euroscepticism as a niche concern of Farage-fanciers, outweighed by the silent majority of committed British Europhiles. British voters don't like the EU. They just don't care that much. The EU has been an accepted fact of life and despite their distaste for it, the British public have generally not allowed it to govern their voting intentions. Ask William Hague and Iain Duncan Smith. Forced to express their opinion in the voting booth, however, who knows how they'll behave.
Brexit's still madder than a bag of weasels though... right?
So the outists have had a good two and a half years. Despite UKIP's electoral failure, Britain still seems closer than ever to leaving the EU. But that doesn't mean they might actually be right. Right?
The issue is not that Cameron's renegotiation has strengthened their argument, but weakened the case for staying in. The true madness of the Brexit argument lay in its contradictions. It claims that we have no influence over the EU now but our economic heft would guarantee us a seat at the table in the future. It claims that free trade with the EU is possible while maintaining freedom from Brussels trading standards. Free movement between France and Germany would work and our Spanish holidays would be visa free but there'd be no more pesky immigrants (apart from the ones we need of course). It's the have your cake and eat it campaign.
The arguments to stay in though are just as fantastic. We dream of a Britain at the heart of Europe, guiding and influencing, saving Europe's people from the wild imaginings of the Eurocrats, taken seriously on the world stage as a serious power in the world's largest economy.
Well... that's for the birds.
Europe interested in our leadership or concerned about our influence. Europe's own leaders have their vision and they are not about to be diverted from it. We have played the biggest, most threatening card in our hand and been greeted with a shrug. In the face of Eurozone crises and the potential collapse of Schengen, Britain's concerns are of no consequence. European leaders would rather hold on grimly to their own fantasy of European integration than accommodate any alternatives. Europe is moving in their direction whether we like it or not.
If that's the case, though, if the great ship of Europe really cannot be shifted in its course, do we want to lash ourselves to its mast once again? Do we want to start another 40 years of argument and resentment? Maybe we would be better off parting ways.
I'm starting to give up on my own European fantasy; and once I've done that, maybe Brexit won't seem so crazy after all.
