ABSTRACT
The vote for Brexit poses a fundamental challenge to Conservative statecraft, the most profound the party has faced since Edward Heath’s administration secured entry to the EEC in 1973. The referendum result was the central failure of David Cameron’s premiership, prompting his immediate resignation. It exposed the limitations of his efforts to modernise his party (Kerr and Hayton 2015) but also reflected deeper tensions that have animated Conservative politics throughout the democratic era. This chapter analyses these utilising Andrew Gamble’s (1974) conceptual framework of the politics of power and the politics of support. In his seminal text, The Conservative Nation, Gamble argued that the Conservatives have traditionally sought to balance the demands of electoral politics with a desire to uphold the prevailing politics of power (through which the state reflects the interests of capital). The need to cultivate a politics of support that does not challenge the fundamentals of the economic system explains the ‘Conservative wish to base their appeal to the electorate on a national rather than a class perspective’, most famously articulated through the language of ‘One Nation’ conservatism (ibid.: 18). It also helps account for the historic reputation of the party as one willing to compromise in order to secure power and its self-image as a party of practical government rather than ideology. Managing the process of leaving the European Union raises the possibility of a major conflict between the politics of power and the politics of support. If the party leadership can navigate a way through this hostile terrain, Brexit may be recorded by history as an exemplar of Conservative statecraft. However, the process is unlikely to be a smooth one and threatens to destabilise British politics and cause ructions in the Conservative Party for years to come.
