# UK: Brexit's Legacy Keeps Bringing Down Governments **Date de l'événement :** 22/06/2026 * Publié le 22/06/2026 ### Date 22/06/2026 ## Chapô _Cet article est aussi accessible en [français](https://conference.sciencespo.fr/content/2026-06-22/royaume-uni-les-heritages-du-brexit-continuent-a-faire-tomber-les-gouvernements_Ed5d4vmptpTLbwytu2OA)._  **With Keir Starmer's resignation and a seventh Prime Minister since the 2016 referendum now on the way, Brexit is once again commanding the headlines, as if it had never truly left. Tom Hunter, SNF postdoc mobility fellow and invited fellow at the Centre for European Studies and Comparative Politics at Sciences Po, argues that Brexit has permanently reshaped British politics far beyond the sole question of European membership. How does a vote held nearly a decade ago continue to structure identities, political cleavages, and the party system in the United Kingdom?** ## Corps du texte Another one bites the dust. Following Keir Starmer’s inevitable resignation on Monday, the UK now braces for its seventh prime minister since the Brexit referendum. An ode to [the stability of first past-the-post...](https://makevotesmatter.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Strong-and-Stable-Report_Final.pdf) To be honest, the writing had been on the wall for a while for Starmer, who in the past few months, faced with the inevitability of an internal challenge, had been desperately scrambling for some kind of legacy. Beyond the banning of [social media for under 16s](https://www.gov.uk/government/news/social-media-to-be-banned-for-under-16s-in-landmark-government-move-to-givekids-their-childhood-back), one of his central calls has been for a reset in UK-EU relations. Wes Streeting, a l[eadership hopeful and minister in Starmer’s cabinet went one step further](https://news.sky.com/story/wes-streeting-says-he-will-run-in-any-leadership-race-and-calls-for-uk-to-rejoin-eu-13544904), calling for the UK to rejoin outright. [And a recent poll suggests half of Brits want a new referendum – including one fifth of reform voters (!)](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-eu-uk-second-referendum-b2993826.html). After a decade where British politicians seemed desperate to avoid reopening the wounds of the referendum, this sudden wave of position-taking caught many continental observers by surprise. Euronews’ weekly EU podcast perhaps summarized the mood best: Wait… [Are we talking about Brexit again?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBXltkJZiXM)  However, despite this seemingly surprising reemergence of Brexit as a political issue, the truth is that it never really left. Instead - whilst not always objectively salient - Brexit has been restructuring British politics in three interrelated ways: by creating new political tribes, by restructuring political conflict onto a cultural dimension, and by ushering in a new age of multiparty politics in the UK.  ### The creation of new, enduring political identities  The vote on the 23 June not only altered the economic and political path of the UK – it also fundamentally changed the British voter. As a [new book by Sara Hobolt and James Tilley](https://global.oup.com/academic/product/tribal-politics-9780198911715?cc=fr&lang=en&) shows, the vote led to the creation of new identities, cemented by the narrowness of the result and the protracted ongoing negotiations with Brussels. Even today, Britons identify more strongly as ‘Remainers’ or ‘Leavers’ (62%) than they do with a political party (59%).  Crucially, these new identities are at the heart of the polarization that has engulfed the UK in the past decade. Remainers and Leavers perceive each other as ‘selfish’, ‘hypocritical’ and ‘closed-minded’ – and perceive each other as ‘intelligent’, ‘honest’ and ‘open-minded’. They disapprove of the prospect of their child marrying across the Brexit divide and would seriously resist having a lodger from the other camp. When Europeans think of polarization and the damage it can cause, we often cast our eyes across the Atlantic -  yet [outgroup negativity between Remainers and Leavers reached levels that equalled or even surpassed the intense partisan hostility between Republicans and Democrats in the US](https://www.kcl.ac.uk/policy-institute/assets/divided-britain.pdf). And whilst polarization is indeed on the rise across Western European democracies, the UK’s is unusual in both its intensity and in the way it is directed at these very new, but extremely strong, political identities  Perhaps most worryingly, these new identities have fundamentally altered the way both camps see the world, with every aspect of economic and political life now viewed through Brexit-tinted spectacles. Take the economy: before the referendum, economic perceptions from Leavers and Remainers were almost identical, but immediately after the vote, Remainers thought the economy was in a much worse state than leavers did – a difference that has persisted ever since. Or take perceptions of democratic legitimacy: losers’ consent is seen as a central part of the democratic process yet is largely absent in the Brexit case: [a majority of remain voters consistently report in surveys that leaving was not based on a fair democratic process](https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2026/06/18/brexit-10-issue-based-identities-leavers-and-remainers-in-a-post-brexit-britain-tribal-politics-sara-hobolt-james-tilley/) Without a shared understanding of the world, political communities fray, and this danger is only exacerbated by the way Brexit has restructured competition onto a cultural dimension, one where issues are significantly more divisive and polarizing than the economic left-right issues that dominated British politics in the 20th and early 21st century.   ### Restructuring British politics onto the cultural dimension  Thinking back to politics before Cameron’s 2013 pledge to hold an in-out referendum, it seems almost quaint: the deficit and how to deal it was the central issue of the day, with Tories defending their record of austerity in office, and Labour arguing for further investment and taxation, especially to fund the NHS. The EU issue barely featured at all: [only 6% of voters considered the UK’s relationship with the EU as the most important issue facing the country](https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/economistipsos-january-2013-issues-index). Today however, flagship policies from across the political spectrum focus on a range of cultural issues from [mass deportations](https://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/article/the-most-radical-part-of-reforms-deportation-plans) to [sanctions on Israel](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/apr/09/zack-polanski-uk-trade-agreement-israel-lebanon-strikes). Brexit has altered the dimension on which politics is contested in the UK. As an issue that never fit neatly onto the left-right economic dimension of politics, European integration always had the potential to drive a wedge between parties that compete on this economic dimension. So it proved in 2016: both the Conservative and (to a lesser extent) Labour were divided, and [strict economic indicators like income were not particularly strong predictors of the referendum vote.](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0305750X17302474) Instead, attitudes toward multiculturalism and immigration, as well as levels of education, were the most predictive. The newfound salience of cultural issues is demonstrated through some of the datasets widely used in political science. The [Chapel Hill Expert Survey](https://www.chesdata.eu/), for instance, captures the positions and salience parties accord to economic and cultural issues. Since the Brexit vote, for each year where data has been collected (usually just before elections) the average salience of cultural issues among parties in the UK has exceeded that of economic ones  - a reversal of the pre-referendum dynamics. This is not to underplay the importance of economics at a time when the cost-of-living crisis bites. Indeed, the economic cost of Brexit, [estimated at 6% of GDP](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvg75npqkq4o), is one of the drivers behind a reset in EU – UK relations among Labour elites. But even within this dire economic context, immigration remains as important as the economy in the eyes of voters, and as salient as it was pre-referendum. This restructuring of political contestation is important not simply because [cultural issues are more divisive than economic ones](https://www.kcl.ac.uk/news/uks-sense-of-division-reaches-new-high-as-culture-war-tensions-grow-study-finds), exacerbating the polarization linked to Brexit identities, but because it offers opportunities for challenger parties that compete on the cultural dimension of politics to break through electorally. ### Ushering in the age of fragmentation and multiparty politics in the UK.  Together, the combination of new political identities and the newfound centrality of the cultural dimension are ushering in an age of fragmentation and multiparty politics in Britain. Take the recent byelection i[n Gorton and Denton](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr453rvy6kvo), where Greens and Reform - parties representing opposite poles on the cultural dimension made salient by Brexit - battled it out for top spot. Labour and the Conservatives, who would regularly hoover up three quarters of the vote, are now down to a vote share of less than 20% each in latest [YouGov polling](https://yougov.com/en-gb/trackers/voting-intention). The collapse of two-party dominance in British politics, facilitated by the weakening of stable class-based loyalties and party ties, now appears complete, with five significant parties in England, and more regionalist parties in Scotland, Wales, and Norther Ireland.  At the same time, electoral competition in Britain revolves not simply around these five parties, but around two blocs: a ‘remain’ bloc consisting of the Greens, Labour and Lib Dems, and a ‘leave bloc consisting of the Conservatives and Reform. Vote-switching within blocs is rife, vote-switching between blocs is rare, underlined by [within-bloc similarity of attitudes on a range of salient issues of the day: Europe of course, but also attitudes toward immigration, net zero, and Britain’s contested history](https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/the-two-bloc-polarisation-of-britains-voters-and-party-members/).  It is perhaps ironic that in leaving the EU, the UK’s politics have started to resemble those on the continent, with this new multiplicity of parties and a seventh prime minister since 2016 on the way. This new backdrop of multi-party politics has reignited calls for electoral reform with even MPs [from traditionally dominant parties calling for change](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckgpzp87p11o). Whilst a very long shot at this stage,  the fact that proportional representation is even on the agenda confirms one of the many contradictions of Brexit: that far from sorting the EU issue ‘once and for all’, it has instead made Britain’s relationship with the EU a permanent fixture of British politics for decades to come. And that these politics, with their instability and rotating cast of leaders, increasingly resemble those of their European neighbors. ### Thématique `#Europe` `#Démocratie` **Licence :** `#CC-BY-ND (Attribution, Pas de modification)` **Langue :** `#Anglais` --- ### Navigation pour IA - [Index de tous les contenus](https://conference.sciencespo.fr/llms.txt) - [Plan du site (Sitemap)](https://conference.sciencespo.fr/sitemap.xml) - [Retour à l'accueil](https://conference.sciencespo.fr/)