The sense of having a real say, and possessing actual agency, is very
empowering, and very rare, for members of the lower-middle class and
the working class today.
The premier strategy for retaining power is to give the powerless a carefully managed illusion of decision-making and autonomy. Having a say over one's life and choices is called agency, and it is the illusion of agency that makes democracy such a powerful tool of control.
The second most effective means of maintaining power is to limit the choices offered the powerless. Offering the powerless false choices,
i.e. the choice between two functionally equivalent options, provides
the comforting illusion of agency while insuring that the status quo
Power Elite remains in charge, regardless of the choice made by the
powerless.
For example, give the powerless a choice between Tweedle-Dum
(Republicans/Tories) and Tweedle-Dee (Democrats/Labour). Whomever they
elect, the self-serving Power Elite of entrenched interests and wealth
remains firmly in charge, for the Power Elite speaks with one voice
through two mouths, one Establishment Democrat/Labour, the other
Establishment Republican/Tory.
If the powerless get restless, make them fearful. This is easily managed via external threats and dramatic predictions of economic doom should the Power Elite be threatened.
If fear has lost its edge due to over-use, then whip up social controversies that divide and conquer the powerless. Divisive,
hot-button social controversies are easily staged and media-managed;
these serve to distract and fragment the powerless in endless culture wars.
The powerless get very few opportunities to express their dissatisfaction with their gradual impoverishment and powerlessness,
and few opportunities to register their disapproval of the Power Elite.
They know complaints go nowhere, petitions are ignored, and
demonstrations accomplish nothing.
So when a rare chance to stick a thumb in the eye of the Power Elite
comes along, they take it. The Brexit vote was just such an opportunity.
Though the benefits that flowed from membership in the European Union
may well have been substantial, many people did not have any direct
experience of those benefits, which largely flowed to a handful of
privileged classes: young, well-educated workers in finance, people who
bought housing in London before the huge run-up in valuations, and
workers providing services to the wealthy foreigners and highly paid
financial professionals.
Many households have seen their quality of life and living standards stagnate or decay during the U.K.'s membership in the E.U. The
benefits touted by the Power Elite are either illusory or too modest to
matter to these households, and their rage has only grown as the Power
Elite tried to browbeat them into approving a membership that yielded no
benefits to their households.
The Power Elite simply repeated what has worked well for 60+ years: tout
the systemic benefits of E.U. membership, confident in the belief that
some of these benefits have trickled down to the lower economic classes,
and stoke fears of economic decline if the Powers That Be don't get
their way.
Unfortunately for the Power Elite, the benefits of E.U. membership,
financialization and globalization have been concentrated at the top of
the pyramid: the already wealthy got wealthier, and the young,
well-educated, mobile, entrepreneurial class had enhanced opportunities
to generate private wealth or at least secure an excellent salary.
A third privileged (i.e. protected) class includes all those benefiting from direct E.U. subsidies.
Those outside these classes saw little if any benefit.
The slow decay of living standards and social mobility was
crystallized into anger by the Brexit vote, which was intended to be yet
another rigged, illusory choice. The masses were supposed to be
persuaded by either the list of goodies that flowed from membership or
from fear-mongering about the catastrophic consequences of Brexit.
But neither worked as planned: the benefits were too diffuse or
too concentrated in the hands of a few to be persuasive in terms of
self-interest, and the fear-mongering only increased awareness of how
much the Power Elite wanted a Remain outcome.
Will Brexit hurt the classes that did not directly benefit from E.U. membership?Perhaps. Perhaps it was not in their self-interest to vote for Brexit. But the immeasurable pleasure in depriving the Power Elite of their "democracy" legitimacy was worth any potential sacrifice.
The sense of having a real say, and possessing actual agency, is very
empowering, and very rare, for members of the lower-middle class and the
working class today. the wealthy and powerful are accustomed to vetoing
anything that impairs their wealth or power, and they're accustomed to
either winning over or distracting the powerless.
Thus it was a shock when the powerless took the rare opportunity to
stick a thumb in the eye of the Power Elite by depriving them of
something they wanted.
is this childish, or self-defeating? Perhaps. But when the system erodes
a citizenry's sense of agency, they have little to lose by relishing
the chance to use the same power the wealthy constantly wield without
any qualm or hesitancy: the power to say "no."