The Flawed Politics of Simple Solutions: Why a British Referendum on EU Membership Will Not Solve the Europe Question

The predominant strands in the literature on a possible “Brexit” either evaluate the costs and benefits of membership for the UK (Dixon 2014) or deconstruct the party politics behind David Cameron’s promise of a referendum on EU membership (Hodson and Maher 2014). By contrast, this paper scrutinizes the actual merits of holding a referendum to decide this matter. In doing so, the paper queries the assumption that direct democracy can somehow resolve the longstanding Europe question in British politics, a debate dominated by an unhelpful mixture of partisan rhetoric and unreflective euroscepticism that corresponds with the “constraining dissensus” hanging over European integration (Hooghe and Marks 2009). In this context, the analysis explains why the unwillingness of EU member states to countenance UK-specific treaty reform means that the UK government’s strategy of re-negotiating membership in the shadow of a referendum will not allow for a radical reconfiguration of treaty obligations. As well as pointing out the vagaries surrounding EU-related referendum campaigns, the paper demonstrates that an In/Out vote is unlikely to prove cathartic. Eurosceptics will remain dissatisfied in the event of a yes, while a no vote would be the opposite of a simple solution. Since a complete break with the EU is impossible, withdrawal entails – drawing on the Swiss experience – a lengthy politicking over a highly complex post-Brexit settlement revisiting free movement of goods, services, capital, and people. Consequently, the simplicity and decisiveness that a referendum, particularly one that spurns the EU, promises is merely a mirage.