Quote Originally Posted by Peter View Post
History doesnt really teach us that at all. The political class 'manage' democracies in their own interests and they always have done. Brexit did not happen because the political class caved into some irresistible groundswell of public sentiment. A PRime Minister took a measured punt on a cynical electoral ploy which hugely backfired on him.

This isnt the political class caving in to mass sentiment. It is them misreading it and believing they can use it to their own short term gain. In other words, it was a mistake.
No. Because of strong public sentiment, a political party grew from virtually nothing to a point whereby it could 'win' the European election; put a Tory PM into a situation where he had to choose between offering a referendum or losing office; and ultimately win that referendum. That is democracy working exactly the way it should - and is even more remarkable for having come about in an electoral system so heavily loaded against single-issue politics as ours.

It's only a 'mistake' for those technocratic types who wrongly and arrogantly imagine that democratic politics can for any length of time be conducted independently of the wishes of the demos.