And what about closer to home – do you worry for the future of our Union? “I was on the anti-independence side of the 2014 referendum and was pleased by the result, but it was not exactly a resounding victory. So I think there are some pretty poor arguments on both sides, involving what really is a sort of fake history.”. And I think that everything that has happened since then has tended to make matters worse for the Union. And it’s very, very hard to do that, in a time such as this. Certainly it’s been a while since we had a Prime Minister as steeped in history as Churchill himself, isn’t it? “Churchill’s a wonderful example of what I think of as applied history, because the whole of Churchill’s career was based on a series of historical insights. And I think it’s not a bad analogy. What do you think of the argument that the EU has been the guarantor of peace on the continent? In fact, I’m struck when I talk to people in pubs, which I have a habit of doing, how little those historical allusions really come up. Mine wasn’t. I think it’s much more illuminating to look at fin de siècle politics.”. CapX depends on the generosity of its readers. This doesn’t feel like a particularly good strategy with any great basis in British history.

OPINION | NIALL FERGUSON The happy moron and Brexit. Niall Ferguson. They were clearly against independence in 2014. So it’s worth, I think, reflecting on how Churchill would have thought about Brexit. We apologise for the inconvenience. So why worry? It seems like we’ve we’ve just wasted so much political capital on this divorce and we’re divorcing a slowly decomposing spouse.”. From CapX’s Free Exchange, it dates from a couple of weeks ago. So why waste all this time on a divorce from something that is becoming weaker over time, and it’s almost certain not to become a superstate? But these processes are quite hard to time.

One of the arguments Norman made in that book is that liberalism and its mid-19th century variant did indeed suffer a strange death in the late 19th century in Europe, as well as in the United Kingdom. Immigrant overload, not Brexit, heralds the end of the European Union. Please note, as an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Now that we have Boris and a very clear statement of intent with regard of Brexit, it’s worth listening to this podcast. Long-simmering tensions over the influx of migrants from outside Europe have come to a head in Italy, with the right-wing League allying with the leftist Five Star Movement to rein in immigration and resist pension reforms, with Salvini serving as minister of the interior. Earlier this year we spoke to world-renowned historian Niall Ferguson about Brexit, the crisis of European liberalism and the prospects of his home country, Scotland, separating from the UK. And it’s sort of happened again that the centre ground (which was liberal in the standard sense of the term), Christian democracy and social democracy, is crumbling everywhere. So why waste all this time on a divorce from something that is in the end becoming weaker over time and is almost certain not to become a superstate…We’re divorcing a slowly decomposing spouse. I’m not sure I see that in the British electorate. Professor Niall Ferguson gives a historian’s view on Europe, Brexit and politics. Niall Ferguson says Europe is becoming ‘the meltdown pot’ as a steadily increasing stream of immigrants breaks down political unity between EU member states and pushes voters back to national boundaries. But I heard repeatedly the worry expressed that if anything was going to get Nicola Sturgeon over the line, it would be the fiasco down south…”, “I have another historical analogy which I like to play with – I think if you  ask yourself, what is our time most like? You see it in the US, you see that as part of what I think is driving Brexit. I’m not convinced Churchill would have approved of Brexit since it amounts to a leap in the dark to think Britain can simply exit the EU and hope for a bunch of free trade agreements, including with the United States, to turn up – at a time when most of the world is turning away from free trade.

He also offers a personal perspective on Oxford contemporary Boris Johnson. But the lesson of the last 10 years is that it can’t become a superstate. Thoughts on staying sane as an independent professional in a world of chaos and entitlement. Learn how your comment data is processed.

You can listen to the full interview here. Niall Ferguson on Brexit, liberalism and how to think historically. This is, from the vantage point of the average voter, not that freighted with history.”, “It’s just a few Conservative politicians who can’t resist bringing up the Battle of Britain or whatever event appears most appropriate. Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email. Boris Johnson’s persona is a kind of Monty Python version of Winston Churchill.

He even wrote a bad book about Churchill to encourage people to see him as a latter day Churchill…But I just don’t think this stuff resonates. One might call it a phase of backlash against globalisation, when the costs of liberalism, of free trade, of free migration suddenly seem to outweigh the benefits. Because the one thing that didn’t happen was the creation of the European defence union. Remember the starting point for so much euroscepticism was ‘it’s becoming a superstate’. Sign up to our popular email briefing to get the most interesting stories from CapX and the wider web delivered direct to your inbox. Do you think Brexit arose out of a certain version of British history? And, indeed, I think it’s counterproductive because it just makes the Continental Europeans in particular sigh and raise their eyebrows and the Americans think that we are just chronically stuck in the past, whereas I don’t think ordinary people are.”. By Niall Ferguson Share. Ultimately you could argue, in that case Brexit doesn’t really matter – and I would say ‘right, exactly right!’. In that sense, I think Britain was to continue playing the balancing role that it had played, but to use some kind of union of Europe to avert the need for regular conflict.”, “I’m not convinced that Churchill would have approved of Brexit, since it amounts to a leap in the dark to think that Britain can simply exit the European Union and then hope for a bunch of free trade agreements, including with the United States, to turn up at a time when the mood of the world is distinctly turning away from from free trade. NATO is the key to the story of peace in Europe, not the EU, and even when the EU tried to play a peacemaking role in the Balkans in the 1990s it abjectly failed and had to be bailed out by the US.

What era do we most resemble? Niall Ferguson “The European elite’s performance over the last decade entirely justified the revolt of provincial England.

Comments Share. Matteo Salvini speaks during an anti-immigration protest in October 2014 in Milan. And I think there’s a lot of inertia which will keep the European Union going the way the Holy Roman Empire kept going. Take it from a divorcee: Brexit will cost you dear. Why bother with it all? And one consequence of it is to weaken established hierarchies.”, “That happened in the 16th and 17th century and it’s happening now to allow fake news to spread very rapidly – it was witchcraft mania back then, now it’s fake news – to allow an extraordinary polarisation of kind of violence of language that threatens to spill over into real violence and, above all, to erode the sovereignty of states. “That argument has always been the weakest one that the pro Europeans make and it’s a silly argument. He also offers a personal perspective on Oxford contemporary Boris Johnson. Echoes through time: our form of government, Echoes through time: our own responsibility, Echoes through time: those who’ll reproach you. And I still hold the view that, in the end, Brexit will be a footnote in a chapter about the break-up of the European Union. And I would say ‘exactly right!’. 21 June 2016, 12:00am. Click here to subscribe to our daily briefing – the best pieces from CapX and across the web. JA: Do you see any useful parallels between what we’re going through at the moment and previous periods in history? He envisaged Britain after the war in a kind of dual role maintaining the Empire, but playing a part in in a process of unification of Europe designed to avert future conflict. Re-reading his life through the eyes of Andrew Roberts in Walking with Destiny, his excellent new biography, I was constantly struck by how important historical analogies were for Churchill.

It just can’t, the Germans aren’t going to let there be a fiscal union. An error occured, but no error message was recieved. Text settings. So I really struggle with people who bring Churchill up in these discussions. Post was not sent - check your email addresses! Suddenly populists are challenging liberal verities – including free trade – and tariffs are suddenly back in the news just as they were in the late 19th century.”, “So I think it’s worth trying to understand the politics of the today by going back to Norman, re-reading Europe Transformed and realising that we are in one of those phases. All of Macron’s dreams of more integration are already pretty much dead in the water. This is partly ancestor worship because he loves to look back on his famous ancestor, the Duke of Marlborough.”, “But it’s actually more than that. The fact that the Scots didn’t vote to leave of course is not irrelevant. NF: “I was reminded of Norman Stone’s book, Europe Transformed, by the sad news of his death and I went back and refreshed my memory, as I had last read it when I was an undergraduate. Boris Johnson's only way out of Brexit chaos is to resign, Niall Ferguson says Published Fri, Sep 6 2019 4:42 AM EDT Updated Fri, Sep 6 2019 8:23 AM EDT Sam Meredith @smeredith19

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If you value what we do, please consider making a donation. Help support us by disabling your adblocker on our site. So I see the Union under threat now in the same way that it was in the early 17th century, when really the relationships between England and Scotland and Ireland blew up as part of a broader European crisis.”, “I think the future for the European Union itself is quite bleak. Please try again, or if problems persist, contact us with the above error message.