Referendums

Brexit supporters argue that the EU threatens sovereignty and stifles growth, while opponents counter that EU membership strengthens trade, investment, and the UK’s standing in the world.

Test your knowledge of secession and independence movements, from the struggles of the Iraqi Kurds to the battle for Northern Ireland.

Adam Valavanis is a volunteer intern in the Africa program at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, DC. Earlier this month, protests against Comoran President Azali Assoumani turned violent, as armed protesters squared off against the military in the old town of Mutsamudu. Located on the country’s second-largest island, Anjouan, the city has seen a wave of protests from locals following Assoumani’s victory in a controversial referendum, held earlier this summer in which he claims to have won 97 percent of the vote. It upends the country’s power-sharing arrangement agreed to in 2001. Following the recent skirmishes, the governor of Anjouan, a virulent opponent of Assoumani, was placed under house arrest on dubious charges of fomenting violence. Comoros is no stranger to authoritarian rule, having been plagued by coups and coup attempts since independence from France in 1975. The country transitioned to democratic rule in 2001 with the creation of a new constitution. However, pervasive corruption and a weak rule of law have seriously undermined efforts at consolidation. An important feature of the 2001 constitution was the establishment of a power-sharing arrangement in which the presidency is rotated between the three main islands of Comoros—Grand Comore, Anjouan, and Mohéli—every five years. Assoumani represents the island of Grand Comore, and a candidate from Anjouan was slated to assume the presidency in 2021, after Assoumani’s five-year term ended. But, with Assoumani's referendum victory, the rotating presidency has been terminated and the way is clear for him to extend his rule by two more five-year terms. Hence the unrest on Anjouan, whose protesters feel that they will now be excluded from power. He claims that the power-rotation makes it difficult to adequately plan for the future. Snap elections are scheduled for next year. The Indian Ocean state now follows some other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, where sitting presidents have sought to extend their tenure in office. However, the country’s problems are larger than the recent referendum. While the Comoran power-sharing arrangement probably helped the country transition from decades of military rule to democracy, the constitution has serious flaws that Assoumani has been able to exploit. Specifically, the constitution grants disproportionate power to the executive branch relative to the judicial and legislative branches. This has allowed Assoumani and past presidents to ignore court rulings, marginalize lawmakers, and enhance their personal power.

The past year saw voters around the world shake the status quo and reshape longstanding assumptions in elections across Europe, Asia, and Africa.

The Spanish government’s efforts to block a referendum may push more Catalan voters to support independence.

Iraq continues to bedevil American foreign policy, and the world. Now the Kurds will vote on their own state.

The recent vote may not advance Puerto Rican statehood, but it may focus attention on its heavy debts and exposure to upcoming U.S. health-care and budget measures.

The decision by British voters last June to leave the European Union (EU) has thrown that bloc into turmoil. But its implications for Great Britain could be even more profound, portending the dissolution of the United Kingdom. Prime Minister Theresa May could trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty as early as March 15, starting the two-year timetable for negotiating the terms of the UK’s divorce from the EU. The prime minister should beware the Ides of March: It seems all but inevitable that Scotland’s government will respond by calling for a second referendum on Scottish independence. The ultimate result could be the reemergence of a sovereign Scotland, more than three hundred years after the Acts of Union (1706–1707) united the cross of St. Andrew and the cross of St. George. When Scots rejected independence by a 55-45 percent margin in a September 2014 referendum, most assumed the matter had been put to bed for at least a generation. The shocking Brexit vote upended that expectation. As Scotland’s sovereigntist-minded First Minister Nicola Sturgeon observes, Scots who voted for “union” less than three years ago assumed that the (still) United Kingdom would remain in the EU. And in the more recent “Brexit” vote, they overwhelmingly (62 percent) supported the “Remain” camp. Given the dramatically altered landscape, Scots deserve the opportunity to reconsider their ties with the United Kingdom. As Sturgeon sees it, the Brexit outcome revealed “a wider democratic deficit within the UK, where decisions about Scotland are too often taken against the wishes of the people who live here.” Her Scottish National Party (SNP) has been cheered by the comments of no less than former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, who says Brexit makes the case for Scottish independence much more credible. In October, the Scottish government published a draft bill that would (if approved by the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood) launch consultations to authorize a second referendum. Wittingly or not, Prime Minister May has bolstered Scotland’s independence movement by insisting on a “hard exit” from the EU. Scottish members of the UK Parliament in Westminster worry about losing access to the EU’s single market. True, trade between the UK and Scotland (worth £49.8 billion in 2015) is four times the value of Scottish exports to the rest of the EU. But the benefits of the single market are substantial—and many Scots are not willing to risk them in return for greater UK restrictions on migration. On February 7, the Scottish Parliament voted 90 to 34 in favor of a motion that the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill should not proceed. Although purely symbolic, it sent a clear message that Scotland opposes a hard Brexit. In an effort to preserve Scottish access to the continental market, Sturgeon’s SNP government in December released Scotland’s Place in Europe. The paper set out “compromise proposals” designed to allow a post–Brexit Scotland to maintain as many links with the EU as possible. The complex, and probably unworkable, scheme would require the UK Parliament to devolve additional powers to the Scottish Parliament—including control over immigration, business regulations, and international trade negotiations, among others. But the UK government has still not formally responded to the SNP paper, and SNP officials have accused the May government of attempting to hide documents setting out its views. More generally, Scottish officials are increasingly annoyed that their concerns are being ignored as the UK government proceeds with its Article 50 plans. Disentangling Britain from the EU will have enormous implications for the UK’s devolution settlement with Scotland (as well as with Wales and Northern Ireland), the London-based think tank Chatham House explains. As numerous laws and powers are repatriated from Brussels, UK and Scottish officials will bicker over the division of authorities on matters ranging from immigration to agriculture to trade. Sturgeon complains about the lack of consultation between London and Edinburgh. “Scotland’s voice is simply not being heard or listened to within the UK,” she says. May is on firm legal ground in deciding to go it alone. On January 24, the UK Supreme Court ruled that the UK Parliament had to approve any Article 50 negotiations. But that same decision also declared that May was under no legal obligation to consult with Scotland on Brexit. The political terrain is trickier, however. The court’s decision angered Scottish politicians, exposed fissures in the UK’s constitutional structure, and renewed momentum for Scottish independence. To be sure, the outcome of any second referendum is hardly preordained. Support for independence is up several points from a month ago, but, according to a recent BMG poll for The Herald, Scots remain nearly equally divided, with a narrow majority (51 to 49 percent) favoring remaining in the UK. Such numbers should be taken with a pinch of salt, of course. The same polling firm undercounted support for Brexit by four points last June, wrongly forecasting a 52-48 victory for the “Remain” camp. More substantively, the situation is fluid and volatile. Actual Brexit negotiations have yet to begin, and the harder a break that May pushes for, the more ignored and isolated Scots will feel, likely causing opinion to swing toward independence. Alienation from Westminster and disillusionment are already riding high in Scotland. Following the failed 2014 independence referendum, Prime Minister David Cameron’s government sought to win over Scots by passing the Scotland Act of 2016. Intended as a new and improved devolution settlement, it stated that the UK Parliament would normally legislate certain matters only with the express agreement of elected members from Scotland. Cameron promised that Scotland would have the “strongest devolved parliament in the world.” One of the act’s selling points was the argument that continued membership in the UK was the only way for Scotland to stay in the EU (something it might have trouble doing as an independent state). The outcome of the Brexit vote turned that logic on its head. Scotland stayed in the United Kingdom but suddenly stands to lose the EU. Brexit has shown devolution to be “worthless,” declares Scotland’s Brexit Minister Michael Russell. It has “exposed statements” by British officials “that the UK government and Scotland are equal partners” to be “empty, diversionary rhetoric.” Prime Minister May has offered to consult Scotland (as well as Wales and Northern Ireland) on the Article 50 negotiations, but has also made clear that the devolved administrations will play no decisive role in Brexit. Given this context, SNP officials argue, Scotland has no choice but to vote again on independence. Many observers expect a major announcement from the emboldened Sturgeon on March 17, when the SNP holds its Spring conference in Aberdeen. This could include naming a target date for the second independence referendum (which would likely to be held in autumn 2018). Here is where things could get tricky—and could spark a constitutional crisis. Under the Scotland Act of 1998, which established the devolved Scottish Parliament, the British Parliament must consent to any new Scottish referendum. Sturgeon has declared that it is “inconceivable” that the UK government, in the wake of Brexit, would try to block Scots from exercising their right to self-determination. This may be wishful thinking. On February 2, Michael Fallon, the UK Defense Secretary predicted that the House of Commons would veto any such a referendum. Other British officials, while avoiding the term “veto,” confirm that May’s government intends to do just that. Although, sources are now suggesting May could agree to a referendum vote as long as it was after Brexit. Meanwhile, Conservative Scottish MPs are accusing the SNP of "weaponizing" the Brexit debate, “cranking up the grievance machine” in Scotland to ensure Britain’s disintegration. But if Theresa May has plenty to worry about, so does Nicola Sturgeon. Among the many uncertainties in the Brexit/”Scexit” dance is whether an independent, sovereign Scotland would actually be welcomed into the EU—and, if so, how soon and on what terms. Some experts argue that an independent Scotland could be fast-tracked into the EU, potentially by 2023. However, this relies on generous assumptions about the likely reactions of the bloc’s member states. Some EU countries (not least Spain) may be reluctant to ratify Scotland’s EU accession, for fear of emboldening their own restive regions (Catalonia and the Basque country, in this case). Scotland also faces a £15 billion deficit, higher than every EU member state as a percentage of GDP, including Greece, which itself has caused such turmoil for the eurozone. One thing is clear. March 2017 is shaping up to be a momentous month in the histories of the European Union, the United Kingdom, and Scotland, as leaders try to strike new bargains over how political power and sovereignty should be allocated at the supranational, national, and subnational levels.

On August 7, Thais hold a national referendum on a new charter. As I noted in my previous blog post, Thailand has had twenty different constitutions since the end of the absolute monarchy in 1932. Constitutions have been shredded by military governments after coups, rewritten during times of political upheaval, and even (as in the mid-1990s) written with thought and considerable public input and implemented under elected governments. Now, the junta, which took power in May 2014, has stage managed the drafting of a new proposed charter. The charter was written by a military-appointed committee. As I noted in my previous post, the new proposed constitution would significantly undermine Thailand’s democratic future, as it would weaken political parties and likely lead to weak leadership in parliament, with larger parties having to form unwieldy coalitions with many smaller and medium-sized parties. It also would entrench the long-term power of the armed forces to meddle in politics, which have, of course, returned to the center of politics. After a period, between 1992 and 2006, during which Thailand had no coups and the military appeared to have actually withdrawn to the barracks, the army has staged two coups in the past decade. The military government has gone all-out to get a yes vote on the constitution, banning public criticism of the charter and deploying army cadets and other groups of volunteers to urge Thais to vote yes. Last month, the junta charged a group of eight-year-old girls with “obstructing the referendum process” for supposedly tearing pieces of paper that voter lists were printed on. The regime has set up monitoring centers across the country to watch citizens’ actions in the run-up to August 7, and has arrested at least fifty people (not including the girls) for supposedly trying to hold rallies or other events to criticize the charter. But as I noted in my previous posting, dissatisfaction with the junta could potentially lead to a no vote. There is no accurate public polling available on how Thais will vote, but anecdotal evidence suggests that the millions of Thais who supported the previous, elected government are dissatisfied with junta rule. (Polls that have been released showing voters’ intentions are hard to take seriously, since they are being conducted in an authoritarian state and in a period of intense repression.) There are many reasons to think that, if Thais vote no to the constitution, the junta government will continue in power—perhaps until King Bhumibol Adulyadej passes from the scene and a royal succession takes place. Although the king is eighty-eight and reportedly very unwell, this succession still could take years; the king normally lives in a hospital wing and receives some of the finest medical care in the country. Junta leader Prayuth Chan-ocha has publicly stated that he will not step down if Thais vote no on the charter, even though leaders of both of the kingdom’s largest political parties oppose the charter, and the biggest party, Puea Thai, has called on Prayuth to step down if the referendum fails. Instead, if Thais vote no, expect Prayuth and the junta government to set an indefinite timeline for the junta’s continued rule.  In the worst case scenario, the army could wind up ruling into the next decade, operating without a new charter and continuing to rely on military courts and new laws they announce by fiat. There would likely be no progress on any type of political decentralization, which is critical to resolving some of Thailand’s regional divides, and no progress in combating the insurgency in the south. Prayuth and other junta leaders have taken a hard line on talks with southern insurgents. Perhaps only when the king passed from the scene and the crown prince seemed ensconced, stably, in power, would the military allow the writing of another draft charter and then a process toward a new election. And if Thais vote yes on a charter that many elected politicians and civil society leaders see as highly flawed? There will probably be an election next year, even though the charter does not guarantee that; Prayuth and other army leaders have promised an election next year. Thais will wind up with a wider range of parties in parliament, including many smaller and medium-sized parties, and will be unlikely to have any prime minister as powerful as those of the past fifteen years. The Senate, which will be unelected, will have a greater role in policymaking, and could play a central role in choosing the prime minister if there is a deadlock in the lower house. Continued policy paralysis will not only add to Thailand’s lack of progress on critical economic and education issues but also will anger the rural Thais who support Puea Thai en masse, and will believe that their voices are now unheard. Overall, either a yes or no vote could well lead to chaos in Thailand.

On August 7, Thailand will hold an up or down national referendum on a proposed new constitution. Drafting new charters are hardly unusual in the kingdom, which has had twenty constitutions since the end of the absolute monarchy in 1932. (One famous Thai joke told to me by many friends involves a Thai student visiting a library to read a copy of the current constitution, only to be told to check in the periodicals section.) This charter has been drafted by a group of pro-military/royalist former officials, and stage managed by the junta, which took power in May 2014 after months of destabilizing street protests against the elected Yingluck Shinawatra government. To make it as likely as possible that the charter passes, the junta has essentially banned all critical public discussion of the proposed constitution. In one notable example, the military arrested student activists last month just for handing out leaflets that criticized the draft charter. As Shawn Crispin writes in the Diplomat, the junta has implemented “a draconian Referendum Act that carries potential 10-year prison penalties for misrepresenting the draft constitution, criticizing its content, or disrupting the vote.” The junta also has dispatched squads of army cadets across the country to encourage Thais to vote yes on the constitution. The charter is designed, in many ways, to undermine Thailand’s democratic institutions, preserve the power of the armed forces and other unelected institutions, and ensure that either the military or pro-military parties are in power whenever Thailand goes through a royal succession. The military, and pro-military middle and upper classes in Bangkok, may fear that unless they weaken democratic institutions, including political parties, whenever another election is held it will be won by the populist Puea Thai party, a party linked to former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. So, the proposed charter would make it harder for any one party to gain a working majority in the lower house of parliament. The charter also would create a fully unelected upper house of parliament and invest it with sizable powers. It also would create the possibility that parliament could select an unelected person as prime minister—possibly someone from the military establishment. Fears about royal succession are well-founded. The current king, Bhumibhol Adulyadej, is eighty-eight, rarely appears in public, suffers a range of ailments, has lived on and off for years in a hospital wing, and yet is revered by most Thais. Bhumibhol is revered in part because he has played a stabilizing role in Thai society, but also because a massive personality cult has been created around him, built by the palace and the military, over six decades of his rule. Thailand now exists in a state of fear, with many royalists worried that the period after Bhumibhol’s passing will usher in civil conflict, since Thais will reject the next king, or the next king will prove so unstable that he will destabilize the entire country. The current crown prince, Bhumibhol’s heir, is known for his unpredictable behavior, is rumored to be widely disliked by business and military elites, and has rarely shown wise political judgment. Indeed, he enjoys little public trust. Yet although the crown prince would technically be a constitutional monarch when he becomes king, he will inherit a wide range of powers unparalleled anywhere except the absolute monarchies of the Middle East—informal powers, but sizable powers nonetheless over the security establishment, the rich Crown Property Bureau, and the business and political elite. Unlike Thai juntas going back to the 1960s, the current junta has overseen a very harsh government. In 2006–7, during the last coup era—and in most coup governments dating back to the late 1960s—military regimes allowed a certain degree of free expression, as long as people did not hold massive public protests against a coup government. These past juntas also usually appointed technocrats to head up most major ministries—under military rule or de facto military rule Thailand posted some of the highest growth rates in the world between the 1960s and early 1990s—and they eventually handed power back to the public via elections. In Thailand’s 2006–7 coup, that junta followed the same script that had been used in coup after coup dating back to the 1960s. (Thailand has had more coups or attempted coups in its modern history than any other nation in East Asia.) After a year in power, the 2006 junta, which had ousted Thaksin, oversaw relatively free elections, which were won by a pro-Thaksin party, although Thaksin himself was not at the helm. The junta stood down. The current junta is doing everything it can to avoid a scenario where a pro-Thaksin party comes to power again. Besides trying to stack the charter to weaken parties and institutions, the junta has hinted that, if the voters reject the charter, the coup government will stay in power—possibly for an indefinite amount of time. In addition, it has over the past two years launched an aggressive crackdown on all types of dissent in Thailand. The junta has sent hundreds of civil society activists, journalists, opposition politicians, and other potential critics to re-education sessions, which are often held at army camps, and subjected them to worse torture, according to Human Rights Watch and other organizations. It has overseen a growing number of questionable lèse-majesté cases, which are tried in military courts. It has forced many former opposition politicians to sign coerced agreements vowing not to be involved in politics again. However, because the junta has made it so hard to express dissent in Thailand, it has also created a situation in which voting no on the charter could be, for many Thais, the only way they have to show displeasure at the coup government. Though there may be some fraud, the actual voting will likely be relatively free and fair; there is little evidence to suggest that the coup government plans to blatantly rig the polls on August 7. So, it is possible that Thais will reject the draft charter as a rebuke to the military government, and a way to resist giving the army even more, and more entrenched, powers. In the next post, I will discuss what might happen if Thais reject the charter—and what might happen if it passes. I am not optimistic about Thailand’s future under either scenario.

The shocking victory of the “Leave” campaign in Thursday’s referendum was a massive repudiation of the elite-driven European project and a testament to the enduring pull of national sovereignty in an age of global anxiety. It is a momentous decision that will reverberate well beyond the British Isles. Besides posing an immediate, existential crisis for the European Union and the United Kingdom itself, the outcome will embolden skeptics of international institutions and multilateral cooperation in the United States. For the European Union, the referendum is a wake-up call that may have come too late. For decades, the EU has suffered from a dramatic deficit of democracy, as well as of loyalty. Throughout the continent, “Brussels” has long been shorthand for officious, unaccountable Eurocrats meddling in everything from fisheries to the proper shape of bananas. In an effort to close this deficit, the EU and its predecessors created several new institutions, most notably the European Parliament (EP), headquartered in Strasbourg. But the EP lacks real power, and voter turnout in its elections is dismal. The EU—too often distant, opaque, and unresponsive—commands little allegiance among its 500 million inhabitants. These dynamics have been especially corrosive in Great Britain. The UK joined the EU party late (in 1973), after centuries of splendid isolation and imperial grandeur. And it has always been the EU’s “awkward partner.” The British have enjoyed perks of the common market, as well as visa-free travel to holiday in Malaga, but their primary allegiance has and always will be to the nation. Their leaders have reinforced public cynicism, repeatedly using the EU as a scapegoat while promising, in the manner of (soon-to-be former) Prime Minister David Cameron, to “fix” it. The British vote bodes ill for the EU’s future. For decades the bloc’s leaders have seized on the crisis of the day to deepen integration, arguing that the only solution was “more Europe.” That dynamic has run its course. The EU is mired in an ungainly halfway house between a confederation of sovereign states and a federal, even supranational, union. National governments retain many of their powers but delegate others, such as immigration and human rights policies, to the center. That scenario might endure in a smaller grouping of the original Six—Germany, France, Italy, and the Benelux countries. But it is clearly unsustainable in the contemporary EU, a continent-spanning behemoth encompassing twenty-eight member states. The EU’s dramatic, post-Cold War enlargement made eminent economic and geopolitical sense. But a more heterogeneous bloc is also a far more unwieldy one, as divergent national interests and political cultures complicate agreement on common policies. These shortcomings have been on dramatic display in recent years, as the EU has flailed in formulating joint responses to the eurozone crisis and the flood of refugees to its shores. For the first time in its history, the EU faces a real prospect of unraveling. Great Britain will not be the last country to hold such a referendum, or to demand major adjustments in its relations with Brussels. (Already, Marine Le Pen of France’s National Front has insisted on a similar vote.) For the bloc to survive, the continent’s elected leaders must heed the will of the people and renegotiate political bargains among EU institutions, member states, and citizens. The most likely outcome will be a “multi-speed” Europe that allows member states and their citizens greater flexibility to opt in or opt out of particular arrangements and initiatives. For some this may mean more Europe, for others less. Regardless, the accent must be on accountability and transparency. Great Britain, meanwhile, may be in for a rude surprise of its own. In an ironic outcome, Brexit may cause the disintegration of the United Kingdom itself. The Scottish National Party (SNP), which lost a hard-fought referendum on independence for Scotland in 2014, will surely insist that another vote be held promptly on that same question. And given that Scots voted overwhelmingly to “Remain” on Thursday, their English brethren will have no grounds to deny them the exercise of their own popular sovereignty as an independent nation. Britain’s choice, finally, will reverberate in the United States. While most commentators have focused on potential global economic turmoil, given London’s prominence in financial markets, the political implications for U.S. global leadership may be profound. “Brexit” will surely reignite simmering domestic debates over how to balance the defense of U.S. national sovereignty with the imperative of international cooperation. On the one hand, we live in an era of global challenges—from climate change to transnational terrorism, from pandemic disease to financial turbulence—that no nation can manage on its own. On the other, conservative nationalists like John Bolton regularly warn us that global institutions like the United Nations, or proposed treaties like the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, place unacceptable restrictions on our national sovereignty. Those voices will get louder in the wake of Brexit, which Donald Trump himself hailed as the wise and brave decision of Britons to “take back their independence.” Americans should resist the siren song of unilateralism—and recognize how different pragmatic U.S. engagement with multilateral institutions is from British membership in the European Union. In April, President Obama implored British voters not to quit the EU. In response, Boris Johnson, charismatic former mayor of London and champion of the Leave campaign, called Obama “hypocritical” for lecturing Brits “about giving up our sovereignty,” when Americans wouldn’t even sign up to the International Criminal Court. Johnson’s riposte was weak on decorum but strong on substance: the United States has always been determined to defend the supreme authority of the Constitution and the popular will of the American people. It has never subordinated itself to supranational structures—and it likely never will. But sovereignty has two other dimensions besides authority. The first is autonomy, or the freedom to make policy decisions independently. The second is control, notably over the nation’s destiny. The dilemma is that autonomy and control often work at cross purposes in managing globalization. To get what it wants—whether reducing carbon emissions to expanding trade—the United States must often make commitments, enter into treaties, or support multilateral organizations. These arrangements can sometimes constrain its options, but they also promise the United States greater control over outcomes that it could never achieve on its own. Britain’s Brexit reminds us of the pull of national sovereignty and the imperative of democratic accountability in institutions of governance, whether at the domestic or global level. But we should also remember that no nation, even Britain, is truly an island.

MILAN – I do not believe that foreigners contribute usefully by issuing strong opinions about how a country’s citizens, or those of a larger unit like the European Union, should decide when faced with an important political choice. Our insights, based on international experience, may sometimes be helpful; but there should never be any confusion about the asymmetry of roles. This is particularly true of the British referendum on whether to remain in the EU. Just days before the vote, the outcome is too close to call, and there appear to be enough undecided voters to tip it either way. But, with political and social fragmentation extending well beyond Europe, outsiders may be able to add some perspective on what is really at issue. First, it will come as no surprise that, in terms of the distribution of income, wealth, and the costs and benefits of forced structural change, growth patterns in most of the developed world have been problematic for the past 20 years. We know that globalization and some aspects of digital technology (particularly those related to automation and disintermediation) have contributed to job and income polarization, placing sustained pressure on the middle class in every country. Second, Europe’s ongoing crisis (more like a chronic condition) has kept growth far too low and unemployment – especially youth unemployment – unacceptably high. And Europe is not alone. In the United States, while the formal unemployment rate has fallen, large-scale failures in terms of inclusiveness have fueled disenchantment – on both the left and the right – at growth patterns and policies that seem to benefit those at the top disproportionately. Given the magnitude of recent economic shocks, developed countries’ citizens might be less unhappy were there evidence of a concerted effort – based on genuine burden sharing – to address these issues. In the context of Europe, that would mean a multinational effort. But, for the most part – and again throughout the developed world – effective responses have been missing. Central banks have been left largely alone with objectives that exceed the capacity of their tools and instruments, while elements of the elite wait for a chance to blame monetary policymakers for weak economic performance. In the face of non-monetary policy responses that are somewhere between deficient and non-existent relative to the magnitude of the challenges we face, the natural response in a democracy is to replace the decision-makers and try something different. After all, democracy is a system for experimentation, as well for the expression of citizens’ will. Of course, the “new” may not be better and could be worse – perhaps significantly worse. Third, the EU is confronting, in more severe form, a problem facing much of the developed world: powerful forces operating beyond the control of elected officials are shaping citizens’ lives, leaving them feeling powerless. But while all countries must deal with the challenges of globalization and technological change, important elements of governance in the EU are beyond the reach of democratic institutions, at least those that people understand and relate to. This is not to say that local governance is problem-free. It isn’t. Corruption, special interests, and sheer incompetence are common problems. But democratic governance is in principle fixable, and institutional defenses and countermeasures do exist. The situation in the eurozone is particularly unstable, owing to citizens’ growing alienation from a distant, technocratic elite; the absence of conventional economic adjustment mechanisms (exchange rates, inflation, public investment, and so on); and tight limits on fiscal transfers, which send powerful signals about the real boundaries of cohesion. Brexit is a part of this larger drama. It is primarily about governance, not economics. From a strictly economic point of view, the risks for both the United Kingdom and the rest of the EU are almost entirely on the downside. But if that was all there was to the issue, the outcome would be a foregone conclusion in favor of staying. The real issue – effective and inclusive self-governance – is not an easy one to tackle anywhere, because forces such as technological disruption do not respect national boundaries. In part, Britons are voting on whether their capacity to navigate in these turbulent waters is enhanced or diminished by continued EU membership. But a more fundamental question of political identity is also at stake – just as it was in Scotland’s independence referendum in 2014. Some Britons (perhaps even a majority), and many other EU citizens, still want future generations to think of themselves as Europeans (albeit with a proud British, German, or Spanish origin), and are prepared to take another shot at reforming Europe’s governance structures. And they are right to think that the world would be a far better place with a united, democratic Europe as a major force for both stability and change. That is my hope, though it may border on wishful thinking. Regardless of the outcome of the Brexit referendum (like many outsiders, I hope Britain votes to stay and advocates for reform from within), the British vote, along with similar strong centrifugal political trends elsewhere, should bring about a major rethink of European governance structures and institutional arrangements. The goal should be to restore a sense of control and responsibility to the electorates. That would be a good outcome in the long run. It would require inspired leadership from all corners of Europe – including government, business, organized labor, and civil society as well as a renewed commitment to integrity, inclusiveness, responsibility, and generosity. That is a tall order; but it is not an impossible one to fill. This article originally appeared on project-syndicate.org.