Wisdom From the Land of the

In this section:

21: Wisdom From the Land of the Chinese Chippy 23: Rising Against or Rising to the Occasion: Considering the Extent to Which Protests are an Effective way of Producing Real Change

Wisdom From classic chips and gravy and the meaning of going out out in winter itself, and the style of its media coverage, that polarized people on without a coat. But by far the most the matter. This polarization was the Land of informative have been our discussions on Brexit, specifically in exacerbated by the rise of the migrant crisis issue and drastic the Chinese the context of the geographic cleavage present in Britain. variations in predictions that opposing campaigns provided for Chippy There have been mentions on behalf voters to make up their mind. Brexiteers promised the NHS would of both the Labour and Conservative receive £350 million a week as a By Alice Palmer parties insinuating the UK should result of leaving the EU, more At risk of coming across aggressively classist and hopelessly conservative, I will begin this article with a short anecdote. To give credit where credit is due, I thank Liverpudlian Isabella Frascina Weston for bringing me down to earth. leave the EU since the late 70s. independence from the wretched hands of far-off politicians in Brussels, and that a free trade deal with the EU would, in the words of Tory MP Liam Fox, be “the easiest thing in human history”. Remainers, on the other hand, relied on the so-slandered “Project Fear” to gather a “It is easy to see why those dissatisfied with the way the government is run would look at the Remainers’ lack of argument and think that Coming to university, one of the most insightful experiences has been becoming close friends with a at least by leaving they could affect some change .” following, without giving voters any legitimate reasons to stay in the EU. dreaded “Northerner”, i.e. the aforementioned Liverpudlian Isabella. She has shared with me knowledge on a number of topics including the culinary glory of a However, before David Cameron called the referendum and campaigns ensued, EU sentiment was neutral and broadly undisturbed. It is the referendum It is easy to see why those dissatisfied with the way the government is run would look at the Remainers’ lack of argument and

think that at least by leaving they Though the results of the Brexit research have yielded, there is a could affect some change. There is vote do not quite align themselves rather significant trend in line with nothing worse than feeling with party voting, I argue that they disparities of income within classes. unheard and unrepresented, but do align themselves with the class As headlined in the Wirral Globe: this is a feeling continuously cleavage delineated by the “The poorer the area, the bigger propagated by politics in the UK infamous geographic divide. It its Leave vote”. Those unhappy and its disproportionately privately would be incorrect to make the with their financial situation, and educated leaders. Clear patterns assumption that lower-class voters comparing themselves to others, present themselves when looking are more likely to vote Labour and were more likely to see Brexit as at a map of the distribution of higher-class to vote Conservative. an opportunity for change than Brexit referendum votes. Labour is supported by copious anything else. Disregarding Scotland and Wales liberal progressives, including for the sake of analysis, urban many young people, who concern The majority of Northerners, on areas including big cities like themselves with issues of social average experiencing lower levels London, Bristol and Manchester justice, and Conservatives are of academic attainment, higher voted to remain. These are more supported by many small-town poverty rates and unemployment likely to be financial centers with a self-made citizens across the and epitomizing low British social high concentration of students and country. mobility, did not vote for Brexit young voters, i.e. those statistically because they hate the EU. They more likely to vote remain. Other However, a quick google search did not even vote for Brexit than the exception of such big will be very fruitful in exemplifying because they believed their jobs cities, the result appears quite exactly how the North and South were being stolen by immigrants. clearly split between the North and of the UK differ in most socio- They voted for Brexit in protest of South, with the South mostly economic indicators: from average their social and financial situation; voting Remain. income and cost of housing to because they do not see anyone quality of public healthcare and from Birkenhead driving their Class is arguably the most higher education provision, cause forward in Parliament. They significant cleavage to form as a amongst most other indicators, the see only Oxbridge educated result of the Industrial Revolution. North consistently falls short of the Geographers who have no idea As new owners of industrial capital South. Zsolt Darvas, Senior Fellow what it’s like. Therefore, I believe entered the budding elite, workers at Bruegel Think Tank, published a there is sufficient evidence to unionized in an attempt to remove research paper in which he used suggest that the Brexit vote was a injustices related to working regression analysis to show how protest vote, exemplifying conditions and economic high inequality and poverty were geographic, and ultimately class, disadvantages; demands major factors in triggering the cleavages in this country that have expressed by the socialist parties Brexit protest vote. Additionally, as persisted throughout history. emerging at the time. In countries many studies and my own like the UK, the elite allowed these political developments, integrating socialist parties into national politics, which explains why industrialized cities of the British North are historically home to Labour supporters. With one of the simplest cleavage structures existing today, class represents a key part of English politics; the resolution of the church-state cleavage during the Reformation and rural-urban cleavage in the 19th century left nothing other than a class cleavage to persist, leading to the two dominant parties present currently.