The Economics and Politics of Brexit: The Realignment of British Public Life

We are now living in a new era of British politics, the tenth such since the English invented modern party politics in 1671. How did this come about? That is the subject of this book. The story told here is that we should not think of Brexit as an act of inexplicable national self-harm, a moment of collective madness, or as something that makes no sense. Rather it was the outcome of a change in the way politics was structured, of a kind that had happened before. This is the process of realignment, the replacement of the old aligning issue by a new one and the working out of this in electoral and party politics.

This book lays out the theory of realignment and complements it with historical illustrations. It then uses this theory to tell the story of Britain’s newest realignment.

Stephen Davies, a Senior Fellow at AIER, is the Head of Education at the Institute for Economic Affairs in London.

The American Institute for Economic Research in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, was founded in 1933 as the first independent voice for sound economics in the United States. Today it publishes ongoing research, hosts educational programs, publishes books, sponsors interns and scholars, and is home to the world-renowned Bastiat Society and the highly respected Sound Money Project. The American Institute for Economic Research is a 501c3 public charity.