The effect of the United Kingdoms’s withdrawal from the European Union on the council of the EU

institutional and political consequences

Абстракт

On 31 January 2020 the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland officially left the European Union and its representatives are no longer part of the decision-making process of the European institutions. The current report analyses the anticipated effect from the UK‘s departure on the functioning of the Council of the EU and the potential consequences on the internal voting dynamic and coalition-building patterns within the institution. The paper finds that the bigger member states will be the likely ‘winners’ from Brexit as their relative voting weight will increase during qualified majority voting procedures. The withdrawal of the UK also marks the departure of the country which has traditionally registered the most vehement opposition to legislative proposals in the Council within the decade before the 2016 Brexit referendum. This has specific long-term implications for internal coalition-building and also opens possibilities for further European integration in certain limited policy areas such as budgetary matters, as well as security and defence policy.