This week's Brexit vote was officially about the United Kingdom's membership in the European Union. But the referendum's result, which will split Britain from the 28-nation bloc, was concurrently more inward and more international in scope.
"This isn't really about Britain exiting, it's about England exiting," said University of Minnesota Distinguished McKnight Prof. John Watkins, an expert on British history and literature. Two days before the vote and right before a trip to Britain, Watkins spoke of the split within England between more cosmopolitan London and "more backcountry England — your basic beef-and-potatoes regions." But overall, he added, "If you are an Englishman, you do not think of yourself as European, you think of yourself first and foremost as English."
Even before the vote that roiled governments and equity markets, U.K. disunity was evident. For instance, it wasn't Great Britain's Union Jack but England's red St. George's Cross flag unfurled in force recently. Ostensibly, England's football (soccer to us Yanks) team competing in the 2016 European Championship was the reason. But the dual meaning was evident, said Thomas de Waal, senior associate at Carnegie Europe.
"It's a question of British identity and English identity," de Waal said from London on the eve of the vote. "There has been more power given to Scotland and Wales and Northern Ireland, but no one has really dealt with the English question."
The answer to the English question brings new questions about Scottish independence, and whether the United Kingdom will remain just that. And across the English Channel, rising right-wing challenges to pro-E.U. governments could result in a continental contagion risking the efficacy and even the existence of the E.U.
More overt than the message from flags was Fleet Street staking out Brexit positions. Because newspaper readership is more ideologically than geographically driven, "what you read in the morning tells more about your political views than what you read in the U.S.," said Watkins.
"This is no time to revert to Little England," argued the Financial Times. "We are Great Britain. We have a contribution to make to a more prosperous, safer world."
"BeLEAVE in Britain," countered the Sun, which — like most tabloids — favored a split.