The 2017 General Election has been billed “The Brexit Election”. However, the key issue many voted on in the 2016 EU Referendum – taking back democratic control – has so far been largely absent from the discussion. While recent Brexit negotiations between the UK government and the EU have taken place behind closed doors: far away from the British public.
It has long been argued that there is a “democratic deficit”, for which the EU is often given the blame. But in reality, as recent elections have shown, the problems of representative democracy run deeply throughout all Western societies.
So would leaving the EU really be enough to “restore democracy” to the UK? What do people mean by “taking back control”? And what do we want the future of democratic politics to look like?
