Boris Johnson’s huge win as predicted by exit polls in the historic British elections today could change Europe as much as the United Kingdom, especially if the Scottish nationalists who also won massively demand independence from Britain after Brexit.
Johnson, who has regularly been the butt of mocking jokes in Britain and Europe, has dealt a sharp slap in the face of many political pundits with his likely majority of 86 seats. It would be the largest for Conservatives since Margaret Thatcher’s 1987 win with a more than 100 seat majority.
It is a little early to analyze this upset victory but a few points seem to be emerging through the fog. Johnson will have unprecedented room for maneuver to choose the kind of Brexit he can push through the dense European bureaucracy and the large body of British voters who prefer to remain in the European Union.
Whether he goes for a hard Brexit, meaning one that separates Britain aggressively from the EU, will depend on the outlook for Britain’s economy when it is unmoored from Europe which accounts for 40% of its trade. The Remainers will be paying close attention.
It will also depend heavily on how the Scottish nationalists who strongly oppose Brexit will play their hand, meaning will they choose to risk staying within a United Kingdom out of the EU or struggle to delink from the UK to continue Scotland’s membership of the EU.
Johnson is committed to preventing any Scottish move to leave the UK but he will have to face the politically difficult fact that polls give 55 out of 59 available seats to the Scottish Nationalist Party.
A hard Brexit will also create problems for him in Northern Ireland where the Protestant Unionists have struggled ferociously to remain in union with the UK, although the Catholic Irish republicans lean heavily towards Ireland because it is a member of the EU.
Politics on the Irish Isles is very fraught. For over two decades north and south have operated as a single cultural and business area since both Ireland and UK were in the EU. People from both sides enjoyed border-free travel and an integrated internal market without customs barriers to trade.
This will have to change with a hard Brexit. But the risk is that the decades of civil war, which wracked Northern Ireland between Unionists and Republicans, may ignite again. It was turned into peace by the Good Friday agreement that ended the separation of families across the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland, among other thngs. But that agreement may shatter because of new hard borders between north and south.
Johnson had worked out a complex deal with the EU to avoid a hard border on the Irish Isles. But many fervent Brexit supporters saw it as a surrender to European rules, which would continue to reign above British laws in relations with the EU.
Today’s election has significantly weakened the fervent Brexiters, giving Johnson room for maneuver to choose among a hard Brexit, a not so hard Brexit or a soft Brexit. The two softer options would involve some surrender of sovereignty to EU regulations through more compliance.
Since Brexit must happen by January 31 next year, the Christmas season may not hold too much good cheer for Johnson despite his heady victory.
His choices will profoundly affect Europeans because a hard Brexit will cause wrenching disruptions in almost all aspects of EU policies. It will also put heavy burdens on EU finances because Britain is a major economy alongside Germany and France and a vital European financial center.
Another factor compounding apprehension is that President Donald Trump continues to play hot and cold with European allies on vital trade and economic issues, including likely imposition of tariffs in several sectors.
He favors a quick trade deal for Britain when it exits the EU but he is a transactional mercantilist, so dealing with him may not be easy in practice. The British will not want to be under an American thumb but their country has very little bargaining power since the US economy is at least nine times richer.