What if Brexit is the true end of the 20th century? What if instead of a resurgence of atavistic nationalism, this was the beginning of its final death throes?
Imagine Brexit tearing apart Britain as Scotland and Ireland separate into their own countries, London turns into a city-state like a (marginally less totalitarian) Singapore of Europe, hopefully also taking Oxford and Cambridge with it out of the rotten husk of an empire England has turned into.
It would suck horribly for innocent people in England, but it would have a certain spiteful sense of justice and vindication; the R tribe tried to impose its values on tribe U, but instead only managed to destroy its country in the name of making it great again. Nationalism dealing the killing blow to the empire which once ruled half the world. The R tribe relies on looting U regions with its “democracy” to fund the imposition of its reactionary worldview and there could be nothing better than for tribe U to turn R’s tricks against it by showing that exit is a two-way street.
Scotland becoming independent seems like almost a given; Irish unification is promising but London is the truly interesting one. If London were to secede, it would show that the nation-state is powerless in the face of global power. The old borders wouldn’t be safe anymore. If the City’s loyalty lies with the rest of the world instead of people sharing some superficial genetic and cultural characteristics, it might open the floodgates everywhere else as well and slay the 19-20th century leviathan for good.
A lot of people have expressed worry that this would be the resurgence of the nation-state and the end of the internationalist project.
I think this might just as well be the end of the nation-state instead.
The age of the nation-state began at the end of the medieval free cities, as cannons allowed kings of the countryside to enforce their rule on cities as well. The social-cultural construct of the nation-state happened in earnest when the nations began shedding their kings and unifying themselves, and it’s easy to see why people might then conclude that the nation-state is the natural endpoint of history to which things will always revert…
Pardon him, Theodotus: he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.
There is no inherent reason why nation-states would be the natural division of people.
Sure, when one looks at the maps, one can clearly see how Scotland is a naturally different polity than England and trying to forcibly keep them together is just asking for trouble.
But London is naturally different too. What does Sadiq Khan’s city have in common with the English UKIP-voting hordes who were willing to ruin their country because they hate brown people? A language, but San Francisco speaks the same language as London. Geographical location, but Ulster managed to stay separate from Ireland for a long time, and Singapore hasn’t been annexed by Malaysia. Political entity, but brexit has shown that polities can be reshaped by the will of the people constituting them.
Nation-states haven’t been a constant in history, but cities have. Every time it has been technologically and societally possible, humans have flocked together and increased each other’s prosperity with trade and cooperation. Democratic nation-states are economically artificial, kept together by barely disguised force; the Paris Commune was brought down by the king’s cannons, not by its own economic infeasibility. The history of the nation-state can be seen as the countryside gaining a capability to loot the cities, and constructing fictions to support this; now what happens if that capability is gone?
When one looks at the data, cities are clearly a different animal from the countryside. Wealthy, liberal, cosmopolitan, globalist. London has far more things in common with Amsterdam and New York than with the English countryside, and in a sense the relationship between the city and the countryside leeching off it via the nation-state is always inherently under a certain tension; now what happens if this is the last straw?
Why should London be loyal to England, when England has shown itself able and willing to only ever take and take? When Scotland tears apart from the union, London’s northern ally in internationalism will be gone and it will be ever more isolated, surrounded by people who are all too willing to enjoy the fruits of London’s prosperity yet completely unwilling to contribute to it, even the bare minimum amount of not actively sabotaging the things that make such prosperity possible in the first place. The story of Atlas Shrugged is naive in its individualistic hero-worship, but replace the few greater-than-life personalities with millions of people, and Galt’s Gulch with London and it starts making a strange amount of sense.
If London were to leave England to the mess of its own making, it would deal a humiliating blow to the countryside, itself grown fat off the loot from the cities and fearful of immigrants and foreigners, the exact people who created the riches the countryside has for so long been stealing through the ballot box. And it’s not like the cities are even unwilling to share their riches; and it certainly might be different if all the countryside asked for was some money so it doesn’t starve, but the countryside is not satisfied with material sharing; what it truly wants is submission.
Like a classical abusive partner, the countryside has always been telling the city it cannot survive alone, yet in reality only the threat of violence is the only thing maintaining the relationship. The countryside stays at home, growing ever more unemployed and useless, while the city is working hard to feed them both. The countryside continuously stalks the city whenever it leaves the house, suspicious of everything the city is doing with foreigners, prone to jealous fits of anger whenever the city doesn’t submit sufficiently to its will. “What are you doing with those foreigners and immigrants? Do you not love me? I am your only one, nobody else may have you!”
Why doesn’t the city just leave?
As usual, the immediate reason is that the dangers of leaving are greater than the dangers of staying. “Sure, the countryside is under a lot of stress but deep down it loves me and after all, it’s not that bad, at least compared to what it would do to me if I tried to dump it; remember what happened to poor Paris?” But if the countryside grows abusive enough, its threats empty enough, the city’s allies strong enough to protect it from its ex, would the city still stay?
I hope the answer is no, and I hope the last straw will be here and now.
If the countryside is so blatantly willing to impose its rottenness on the cities, let it rot away. If democracy creates reactionary atavistic nation-states, to hell with democratic states then. Tribe R doesn’t create the wealth, yet it will always demand its share. “Buy American!” “Britain first!” “Auslander raus!” “Rajat kiinni!” Tribe R will happily take tribe U’s money, but it will reject its values and seek to impose its own. Via the democratic majority rule of the nation-state this strategy has always seen a degree of success; the amount of liberty that’s legal in cities has always been constrained by the conservative countryside. This is clearly an abusive relationship, now what if the cannon marriage of city and country were finally broken?
If London said “no”, would 2016 idly watch by like 1871? What rhetorical pretzels would the nationalists tie themselves into as “fellow brits” rejected their nightmarish utopia? “But you were supposed to be one of us” they would say, and London would whisper “no”. What if the reactionary populism was shown to be the blatant robbery it is? What if England was left to its own devices, without London’s money and influence? The populists could not make Britain great again; they would trash their own country and come begging for foreign aid at London’s doorstep. Without tribe U, tribe R is nothing but a raving bunch of barbarians. A country made solely of Clinton’s voters would still be a global power; a country made solely of Trump’s voters would be a backwards hellhole.
And if tribe R is willing to tear apart political structures at its whims, I say let them have a taste of their own medicine. If they would split the “artificial fiction” of the EU, let us split the artificial fiction of Britain! Let us leave them to their own devices, wallowing in a misery of their own creation. They had a choice, all of them. They could have followed in the footsteps of the IWW or Adam Smith. Decent people who believed in the common good of international cooperation without borders. Instead they followed the droppings of demagogues and populists and didn’t realize that the trail led over a precipice until it was too late. Don’t tell me they didn’t have a choice. Now the whole Europe stands on the brink, staring down into bloody Hell, all those reactionaries and nationalists and rabble-rousers… and all of a sudden nobody can think of anything to say.
Call their bluff. Show them what they are made of. Show them that the world has new rules now, and new rules. That the mob of the nation-state cannot impose its terms upon the cities any longer. That we would’ve been willing to share our riches if that had been the only thing they asked for, but of course it never truly was about the riches in the first place; no, it was jealousy and fear over our way of life, something they wanted to extinguish just as much as to simply loot.
Let this be the end of the EU, but not the new dawn of the nation-state. Instead…
The end of the nation-state and the new dawn of the free city.
London, be our Lucifer, our morningstar, to bear the light to a brighter future free from the oppression of democratic nationalism, nationalistic democracy!
So you still believe you are superior?
What odds do you put on Scotland getting independence within the next five years?
Also I think you are massively mischaracterizing Tribe R, in a totally unfair and honestly kind of mean-spirited way. I’ve met Trump voters. I don’t think they would turn the country into a backwards hellhole. Trump might, but whether his voters would is less obvious. You seem to think that everyone who might vote for Trump (or BREXIT) must be as bad a Trump or Nigel Farage. Tribe R is not made of evil mutants! They’re not going around, scheming about how to mug cities! They’re scared, and frustrated, and maybe ignorant, but they aren’t evil.
Sure, you pay lip service to the “innocent” ones, but then you spend a dozen paragraphs talking about how awful the countryside is. It’s like when SJs go on a long rant about how all men are dangerous and uncontrolled, but they add a little note saying “Oh, but if you’re not like this then you’re fine and this doesn’t apply to you, teehee.”
This whole thing is just… really vindictive. I’m not sure I even disagree with your policy proposals (I have no idea what would happen if London seceded). But, like, the point of London leaving isn’t to punish those stupid poor people for daring to stand up for themselves.
