The University’s Professor Richard Whitman has contributed to a major new report that finds significant political and economic uncertainty characterises the Brexit process one year after the UK triggered Article 50.
Professor Whitman, of the University’s School of Politics and International Relations, contributes a chapter on foreign policy in the report Article 50 one year on, which was produced by the academic group The UK in a Changing Europe. Overall the report finds that across several policy sectors a lack of clear direction is affecting the ability to plan for the future.
In Professor Whitman’s chapter, he argues that foreign and security policy are areas in which the UK government has offered considerable detail as to what it wants from a future relationship with the EU but the EU has yet to provide detail on future collaboration and respond to the Prime Minister’s detailed offer in her Munich Security Conference speech last month.
The report also finds that demographic changes are pulling public opinion in a pro-European direction. By 2021, the electorate will have a ratio of 52:48% Remain and by 2026 it will be 54:46% Remain. This is as a result of rising education, rising ethnic diversity and generational change.
The report covers what has happened since Article 50 was triggered, the negotiations and process of Brexit, politics and economics over the last year as well as what is likely to happen in key sectors.