The June 2016 Brexit referendum left Britain a divided nation. That much we know. But the referendum didn’t create division. It exposed something that was already there, latent. This was hard to see if you attended to people’s conventional political views about taxation or public spending; even the issue of immigration, by itself, wasn’t “it.” Nor was it to be found in something as vague as “feelings” or “emotions.” It lay elsewhere, in the realm of the individual political psyche, that blending of personal, family and nonacademic history, casually informed reasoning, clan prejudice, tribal loyalty and ancestor worship that forms the imaginative framework in which, as we represent it to ourselves, our lives relate to events in the wider world. Read on and comment » | James Meek | Mr. Meek is the author, most recently, of “Dreams of Leaving and Remaining.” | Friday, March 15, 2019
Saturday, March 16, 2019
Opinion: Dissecting the Dreams of Brexit Britain
The June 2016 Brexit referendum left Britain a divided nation. That much we know. But the referendum didn’t create division. It exposed something that was already there, latent. This was hard to see if you attended to people’s conventional political views about taxation or public spending; even the issue of immigration, by itself, wasn’t “it.” Nor was it to be found in something as vague as “feelings” or “emotions.” It lay elsewhere, in the realm of the individual political psyche, that blending of personal, family and nonacademic history, casually informed reasoning, clan prejudice, tribal loyalty and ancestor worship that forms the imaginative framework in which, as we represent it to ourselves, our lives relate to events in the wider world. Read on and comment » | James Meek | Mr. Meek is the author, most recently, of “Dreams of Leaving and Remaining.” | Friday, March 15, 2019
