I think the problem Britain has is that is very exposed to globalization and international trade. I assume the decision to join the EU when it was a common market was to avoid a situation where as a trading nation Britain could not export due to high tariffs which would mean in turn it could not feed itself.
I do however wonder if Britain lost its premier economic place in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries because it became comlacent or because the US and Germany closed their markets to its manufactured goods. Britain is not a vast continental economy and cannot be self sufficient in the absence of international trade. How to guard legitimate British interests and insure open markets without conceding independence is the puzzle that must be addressed by those who are suspicious of the EU.
Britain does have a trade surplus with the EU, the question would be if Britain departed from the EU would open trade remain. Rational self interest would say yes but in politics the emotional pursuit of a vision can easily trump self interest.
In short angry nationalist reactions to globalization will simply create a state directed feudal economy cut off from the outside world. China decided to sever its links with the outside world and informed a British ambassador that their inventions were of no value. This took place just as the industrial revolution was happening in Britain. The result was that the country lost its independence.
There should be a debate about the EU but it should be on the basis that Britain is a trading nation. Nationalism and socialism are not the answers.
Britain, the EU and Globalisation
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as a trading nation we should openly trade with the EU, US,Latin America,Africa including South Africa, the commonwealth nations, Norway, Russia, Iceland. But we find the EU restricts us from other markets. The EU needs the UK more than we need them, it would take two years to flip our production over to ensure food sufficiency and targeted production lines. Afghanistanbananistan |
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There is currently a trade deficit with the EU and this has been the case the case for most of the association. The deficit with the EU (March 2008) widened to £3.7 billion, compared with £3.5 billion in February. Exports rose by less than £0.1 billion but imports rose by £0.2 billion. http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=199 I'm not sure that a debate about the EU and membership of it,membership is the same as a debate about globalization (although they are not necessarily mutually exclusive). PS - The China reference isn't clear to me! Peter |
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Peter, I refer to China a warning as to what happens when countries start to see the outside world as a threat as some anti globalisation protesters do. Opposition to the EU comes from two angles. Those who see globalised trade and finance as a threat to national sovereignty and the EU as just one manifestation of that and those who see the EU as a protectionist club preventing Britain from freely trading. I suspect some people in the London financial sector would be equally suspicious of the EU and the anti EU nationalists because both would place restrictions on their business in the name of national or supra national sovereignty. The debate over economic sovereignty is difficult to disentangle from the EU issue but the fact it is mixed up with it means that opposition and support for EU integration is being driven by people with different aims. It is therefore likely that any referendum will be decided by the uncommitted taking a view of the likely economic impact on themselves of staying in or withdrawing. Opposition to the EU comes from two contradictory streams. I believe Britain must define its interests before seeking to redefine its relationships with Europe. JanetC |
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would lose it's premier position of the nineteenth century. The rise of the United States and Germany relative to the UK wasn't due to protectionism, it was due to size, and that is continuing to this day. We slip slowly down the economic league table, but that is not bad in itself. What matters is our security and standard of living and the need to continue to produce more goods and services than we consume. At present we have slipped from fourth spot to fifth, having only recently been displaced by China. (though France would and does dispute who really is in fifth place right now). Not bad for a tiny off-shore island. I don't see why we can't simply halt the process of being sucked into and submerged by the EU and do more to protect our sovereignty, culture and independence while at the same time continuing to trade with the whole world. Our sheer economic size and geographic position would make it impossible for the EU to exclude us as a punitive measure. Anyway, democratic nations just don't behave that way, they are concerned only with their own enlightened self interest. They don't cut off their noses in a fit of pique. Look at what France has got away with over the years. One thing we would be able to do, that the EU has pevented us from doing for quite a while now, is to go back to a position close to self-sufficiency in food production. Of course, whether with regard to the state of our broken society and it's structural weakness induced by apathy, political correctness and out-of-control immigration, you feel it is worth the considerable effort required, that's another matter. the Badger |
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JanetC, you're too late. Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have already surrendered our sovereignty by signing the EU Treaty. We can no longer compare our interests with those of the EU: they are now the same! Monk of great renown |
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Janet - The opposition to the EU in the UK is paradoxical, the Trade Unions (when they were the Labour party) saw the EU as a capitalist enclave, the free marketers saw it as a socialist enclave. The truth is somewhere between the two. If I'm talking about globalisation, I'm talking about free marketeers who want freedom of global movement for the means of production and supply (what would appear to be the UK view of New Labour and Conservatives). In this respect, I don't believe that the EU are 'globalists' (certainly not the French) and I would agree with this position. Opposition to the EU in the UK by 'voters' is probably entirely emotional. In a nutshell "No taxation without representation". A legislature that cannot balance its books hardly represents the taxpayer. Peter |
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Badger, I don't think that resistance to being submerged by the EU and a desire protect national sovereignty, culture and independence, is unique to the UK. I doubt if it's any stronger in the UK than it is in France. A strength that the EU could play to, is its ability to create a state where such issues were accommodated. The problem is that the track record of the EU doesn't point in this direction. The latest 'treaty' being a prime example of this. Instead of a 'Bill of Rights' we have a Pentateuch. Peter |