Brexit and Trump’s election ranks with the fall of the Berlin Wall as a turning point in history
The age of deference is over and the majority want their interests and values to matter more than those of cultural and political elites
REVOLUTIONS can be gradual, slow-motion affairs or abrupt, dramatic ruptures.
It can sometimes take decades before anybody even notices that everything is about to change. Other shifts happen remarkably quickly, within weeks, days or even minutes.
Members of my generation can remember three such world-changing moments.
There was the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the West’s sudden victory in the Cold War and the Soviet Union’s implosion.
Then there was 9/11, which changed attitudes permanently and triggered wars.
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And there was the financial crisis of 2007-8, which briefly looked as if it would take down the global economy and ended up inflicting immense long-term costs on Western economies.
We can now add a fourth big moment, or rather a brace, of events: and the election of Donald Trump.
Brexit is very much an anti-establishment shift. The age of deference is over and the majority want their interests and values to matter more than those of cultural and political elites.
For decades it was US foreign policy to build a united Europe.
So the fact that the Trump administration now openly wants to undermine the European Union is an astonishing change.
The age of deference is over and the majority want their interests and values to matter more than those of cultural and political elites
It is thus almost impossible to exaggerate the importance of the events of this week.
First there were Trump’s explosive comments against the EU, Germany and much else besides, ahead of his inauguration.
The referendum wasn’t a dream: we are actually leaving, a move that will redefine international history for decades to come.
May has embraced free trade and an open society. She understands that globalisation is under threat, but she wants to use a moderate, liberal form of nationalism to rescue it.
She wants the UK to continue to accept migrants but realises that controls are the only way to prevent the growing backlash.
She has even floated the possibility of the UK turning into a Singapore-style free market economy if the EU decides to erect too many protectionist barriers against us.
Many establishment economists have convinced themselves Brexit means the death of economic liberalism. The reality is it is the only way to save, legitimise and reboot it.
Yet while the tectonic plates are shifting, the EU cannot think, act or change. It is as though the dinosaurs saw meteorites coming but simply plodded on as if all was fine.
Angela Merkel’s attempts at global leadership to date have been disastrous. But she is Europe’s last chance.
She needs to accept the EU is doomed and find a way of working with the next French president to overhaul the organisation, stump up billions for Nato and engage in a controlled dismantling of parts of the eurozone.
It’s either that, or the death of the EU. As for Britain, bring on the Brexit revolution.
Copyright Allister Heath/Telegraph Media Group