scholarly journals Unintended repercussions of Brexit? The departure of skilled Germans from Britain after the referendum

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nico Stawarz ◽  
Nils Witte

Although the referendum on the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union—better known by its portmanteau Brexit—had no immediate legal consequences for migrants, the changed public atmosphere and looming consequences for their status are creating uncertainty among migrants in the UK. This article analyses the impact of Brexit on Germans who lived in the UK and returned to Germany in 2017/18. Our analysis relies on the first wave of the German Emigration and Remigration Panel Study (GERPS), a novel probability-based sample of German return migrants from the EU member countries. The results show that more than half of German return migrants from the UK are strongly affected by Brexit. Furthermore, those who returned on account of Brexit are more likely to blame the political situation, the lack of social security, and their dissatisfaction with life in their host country than those who did not return on account of Brexit – or than those returning from other EU15 member countries. In sum, our results indicate that Brexit may have the unintended consequence of driving out skilled and socio-culturally more integrated migrants who had been living in the UK for several years.

2018 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 99-109
Author(s):  
Jakub Borowski ◽  
Jakub Olipra ◽  
Paweł Błaszyński

Abstract The decision of the United Kingdom (UK) to leave the European Union (EU) is unprecedented, especially considering the recent trend in the global economy toward economic integration. There is a multitude of research concerning the implications of economic integration; however, research in the field of disintegration is scarce. Brexit serves as an interesting case study to investigate the effects of economic disintegration. The implications for trade are especially fascinating as trade liberalization is one of the most important benefits of economic integration. Existing studies focus mainly on Brexit’s impact on the UK’s exports and imports, while less attention has been paid to Brexit’s effects on the trade of other countries. The main objective of our research is to estimate Brexit’s influence on Polish exports. We present several possible scenarios of future trade relations between the UK and the EU and assume that, at least in the nearest-future post-Brexit scenario, trade under the World Trade Organization rules is most likely. This will result in the imposition of tariffs on trade between the UK and the EU members, including Poland. In our research, we used the real exchange rate of the Polish zloty against the British pound as a proxy for the changes in price competitiveness of Polish exports due to the imposition of tariffs. We find that in the first year after Brexit, the dynamics of Polish exports to the UK will decrease due to the imposition of customs duties by 1.3 percentage points (pp) and by 0.1 pp when it comes to total Polish exports. This paper contributes to the discussion on the effects of disintegration on trade. We propose a new method for assessing changes in trade volume due to increase of trade barriers.


2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-113 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris Hilson

AbstractThe departure of the United Kingdom (UK) from the European Union (EU) (often referred to as ‘Brexit’) is likely to have a significant impact on the environment. In this article I argue against seeing the traffic as all one way. While there was a temptation for the advocates of staying in the EU, in the context of referendum campaigning, to portray the UK as a laggard pressured into positive environmental performance by the EU as leader, the reality is that the UK has also strengthened the EU’s environmental policy in some areas and seen its own weakened in others. Influence in both directions has also varied over time. The article goes on to consider core ‘Leave’ arguments around sovereignty and ‘taking back control’, exploring the implications of these in the specific context of environmental governance. In discussing subsidiarity, it concludes that leaving the EU will not remove the need for pooling some sovereignty over environmental matters at the international level and, in the context of devolution, at the UK level.


2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 16-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Annegret Engel ◽  
Ludivine Petetin

This article analyses the impact of Brexit on devolved competences in environmental protection. It maps the post-Brexit division of the United Kingdom (UK)’s internal (devolved) and external (international) competences and how this may shift when competences are returned from the European Union (EU). Crucially, the article suggests that certain of these EU powers do not simply derive from the EU but are, in fact, already held by the devolved regions in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity. Consequently, devolved competences are under threat of being pre-empted as the UK seeks to harmonise otherwise fragmented policies and legislation to comply with obligations at international level. This conundrum is illustrated here using a case study on genetically modified crop cultivation, which identifies the conflicts in the UK’s proclaimed strategy post-Brexit between international obligations and devolved competences and the legal challenges this entails.


This book provides the first comprehensive analysis of the withdrawal agreement concluded between the United Kingdom and the European Union to create the legal framework for Brexit. Building on a prior volume, it overviews the process of Brexit negotiations that took place between the UK and the EU from 2017 to 2019. It also examines the key provisions of the Brexit deal, including the protection of citizens’ rights, the Irish border, and the financial settlement. Moreover, the book assesses the governance provisions on transition, decision-making and adjudication, and the prospects for future EU–UK trade relations. Finally, it reflects on the longer-term challenges that the implementation of the 2016 Brexit referendum poses for the UK territorial system, for British–Irish relations, as well as for the future of the EU beyond Brexit.


2021 ◽  
pp. 001573252110122
Author(s):  
Rupa Chanda ◽  
Neha Vinod Betai

In June 2016, the United Kingdom took the world by surprise with the results of its referendum on whether to remain in the European Union (EU). With a 52% majority, the country decided to leave the bloc in which it had been a member since 1973. With this outcome began the long process of Brexit negotiations between UK and the EU. The UK officially ceased to be an EU member on 31 January 2020, with a transition period up to the end of 2020. The decision to leave the EU came on the back of rising bitterness among people. Membership in the EU was seen as expensive and not beneficial to the country. One of the major campaigning points of the leave camp was the issue of immigration. Given that free movement of people is an important part of being in the EU, the party argued that leaving the EU would help the country take back control of its borders. Immigration in the UK has been on the rise since the early 2000s. It shot up further with the accession of the eight East European economies into the EU. Figure 1 shows how, leading up to Brexit, immigration from the EU to the UK was constantly increasing. JEL Codes: F00, F30, F22, F23


2019 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 230-249
Author(s):  
Andrzej Żurawski

Abstract This article explores Bruno Amable’s Diversity of Capitalism approach to analyze educational systems in the European Union (EU28). The main goal is to identify the main clusters of educational systems with regard to their institutional characteristics. Second goal of the analysis is to evaluate the impact of several EU policies and initiatives on the institutional structure of European educational systems. This article identified six clusters in terms of general education and five clusters in terms of higher education systems. The clustering shows, that – with some exceptions (notably the United Kingdom and Ireland) – European education systems have similar structure to other institutional areas, in particular, it confirms the existence of post-communist (in terms of Farkas) or patchwork (in terms of Rapacki et al.) capitalism. The article shows, as well, that subsystem of higher education is much less diverse, what may have a significance for future discussions on the capitalisms in the EU. Results suggests also that there exist significant differences in performance between the clusters, something that may have a crucial importance for an educational policy.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-122 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tomasz Kubin

The exit of the United Kingdom from the European Union (so-called Brexit) is one of the most important events in the process of European integration. It has a lot of extremely remarkable implications – both for the EU and for the United Kingdom. Among other, Brexit will affect the security of the United Kingdom and the EU. The aim of the study is to answer the research question: how will Britain’s exit from the EU influence the EU common security and defence policy? In order to answer this question, the factors that are most relevant to the United Kingdom’s significance for the EU’s security and defence policy will be identified. This will show how the EU’s potential of the security and defence policy will change, when the UK leaves this organisation. The most important conclusions are included in the summary.


2021 ◽  
Vol 120 (824) ◽  
pp. 112-117
Author(s):  
Alexander Clarkson

European integration based on a supranational form of pooled sovereignty has taken on increasingly state-like qualities. With every move toward absorbing additional members, the European Union system has expanded its geographic reach. The state-like power of the EU is apparent in the impact its integration processes have had in societies just outside its borders. Its growing influence is most notable in misfit border territories, from Kaliningrad to Transnistria, and from Cyprus to Northern Ireland, that are tenuously under the political control of neighboring geopolitical powers.


Author(s):  
Anthony Salamone

As Scottish Conservative leader, Ruth Davidson was a prominent campaigner for a ‘Remain’ vote in the European Union referendum of June 2016. Following the 2017 general election, meanwhile, Davidson repositioned herself as someone who could – aided by 13 Scottish Tory MPs in the House of Commons – influence the Brexit negotiations and nudge the UK Conservative Party towards a ‘soft’ rather than ‘hard’ deal with the EU. This chapter considers the impact of Brexit on the Scottish Conservatives during the leadership of Ruth Davidson in four dimensions: Brexit’s distinct Scottish political context, its electoral consequences, the conduct of Brexit within the UK, and the Brexit negotiations themselves. It concludes with reflections on the future prospects for the Scottish party in light of all four dimensions.


Author(s):  
Federico Fabbrini

This introductory chapter provides an overview of the Withdrawal Agreement of the United Kingdom (UK) from the European Union (EU). The Withdrawal Agreement, adopted on the basis of Article 50 Treaty on European Union (TEU), spells out the terms and conditions of the UK departure from the EU, including ground-breaking solutions to deal with the thorniest issues which emerged in the context of the withdrawal negotiations. Admittedly, the Withdrawal Agreement is only a part of the Brexit deal. The Agreement, in fact, is accompanied by a connected political declaration, which outlines the framework of future EU–UK relations. The chapter then offers a chronological summary of the process that led to the adoption of the Withdrawal Agreement, describing the crucial stages in the Brexit process — from the negotiations to the conclusion of a draft agreement and its rejection, to the extension and the participation of the UK to European Parliament (EP) elections, to the change of UK government and the ensuing constitutional crisis, to the new negotiations with the conclusion of a revised agreement, new extension, and new UK elections eventually leading to the departure of the UK from the EU.


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