What’s the problem with Brexit? Notes from the middle of Britain’s crisis

Abstract

ABSTRACT The Brexit referendum was experienced as a dramatic moment of rupture by millions of people who voted to remain in the European Union. This article argues that the period of uncertainty that came after the referendum was also a highly generative period for new political projects. By following the fluid, dynamic and multi-faceted articulation of Brexit as an issue of public concern – that is, as an issue that represents many distinct problems for different groups of people – this article traces the difficulties faced by these groups, as they attempt to enact public interventions, and consequently to emerge as properly-speaking democratic publics. Drawing on ethnographic data gathered in the aftermath of the Brexit referendum, this article makes the case for an embedded mode of social research that is attentive to the emergence, growth, and evolution of social and political movements, and that is, moreover, able to trace these dynamics over long periods of time.