This is the crude summary of the debate held on 28 June at the London School of Economics, notoriously pro-European, and taken up by a well-known tabloid. If the United Kingdom does not laugh, the European Union can only cry, guilty of having deviated from the original course of social integration. The UK, in a revival of national pride, presents itself as a fragmented country: the old England against Scotland and Northern Ireland, the cities against the countryside and small towns, the young against the old, the result of a dramatic alliance between the less educated and strict conservatives. Social disasters laid bare by the leave on which populism and extremism have blown.
Not a few problems for Cameron's successor. It is well known that the Kingdom has always harbored a Euroscepticism; when it joined the Union in 1973 the Times pronounced "Europe is in", implying that the other countries had to follow in the footsteps of the long British experience in commercial, financial relations and migration policies; Not vice versa. Two years later, a referendum sanctioned membership of the European project by a large majority. The breakup of 23 June will go down in history as a renunciation of guiding the change of the Union "from within" as it had begun to do by introducing virtuous rules inspired by the common law in many sectors. If and when it invokes Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, it will have to face the difficult task of giving up the four cornerstones of the Union: free movement of people, capital, goods and services.
He will only be able to get some benefit without making significant gains. The EU, for its part, collects another defeat in its way of operating, top-down and bureaucratic, contemptuous of popular sentiments and steeped in threats, retaliation or blackmail towards those who do not think like the bosses. The identity crisis and at the same time the prospects for relaunching the EU are all linked to a radical change of direction. If we continue to think only of money and banks, the abyss of disintegration opens. If, on the other hand, common sense prevails simply by recovering the principles of the Ventotene Manifesto in 1941 which spoke of peace and social growth, then the Brexit cyclone will have had the merit of giving that desired boost necessary to resume a more equitable and just path in favor of the marginalized by the benefits of globalization and harassed by the superpowers of finance.
The Brexit earthquake requires the EU to make a qualitative leap, certainly not to bow to the anti-historical and demagogic proclamations of the anti-establishment, but to recover the original values of social cohesion. In the hope of realism, we expect first of all to recognize the failure of austerity policies and the need to reform the institutions by simplifying them, given that the project of political integration is certainly no longer conceivable in such a variegated Europe. The Spanish elections send a partly reassuring message, but the front of the protesters can only be stemmed by changing the political choices and reforming the institutions in a democratic sense. To make this credible, a change of leadership at the top of the Commission and Parliament is needed. And before the six months indicated by Renzi, before the negotiations for the exit of the United Kingdom begin.
It is the Parliament, as the only democratically elected body, which must take over the reins of the integration process by engaging only on issues of undoubted supranational interest and responding to requests that come from below. The most urgent is a firm control of immigration by strengthening the external borders of the Schengen countries, jointly managing repatriations and launching cooperation policies with those countries that will collaborate in welcoming illegal expatriates. Difficult but necessary because the Europeans request it and because it must be recognized that the much preached humanitarianism does not respond to the effective reality of hospitality in our countries and, moreover, irreparably damages the countries of origin. On the economic level, austerity must be corrected at all costs by excluding productive investments from the budget constraint and limiting surveillance to the current account deficit. The protection of the euro is now out of the question and it is best to let the ECB take care of it.
It is then necessary to complete the banking union with the common guarantee on deposits and give concrete form to a gradual harmonization of tax systems starting with the VAT rates. Germany will always be decisive if it demonstrates sensitivity to the relaunch of a renewed Europeanism and if it wants to avoid electoral meltdowns at the 2017 appointment. But the concrete demonstration that Europe is alive and sensitive to the well-being of its citizens can derive exclusively from the ability will have the new leadership to launch social policies capable of correcting the exacerbation of inequalities and aiming at the common welfare. For example by launching measures for the common unemployment insurance, for a gradual harmonization of the social security systems and, especially, to harmonize the school and university systems. Could we wish for a EUROPEAN SOCIAL UNION? * Rome Sapienza Foundation-International Cooperation
