Throughout the Brexit process, Britain has tried to split the other 27 EU member states. But it has failed. Much to the surprise of the authorities in London (and probably Brussels, too), the European Union has lived up to its name — and stayed united.
This display of unity over Brexit is not an accident or a one-off. On the contrary, it says something important about why the European project is much more resilient than its critics realised. The 27 small and medium-sized nations that make up the EU have a powerful shared interest in protecting the European single market.
That strategic imperative is only going to become more pronounced in a world shaped by two superpowers — the US and China. Both Washington and Beijing are increasingly using trade and investment as a political weapon. As individual nations, the EU27 know they can be picked off by the superpowers. But, as the world’s largest cross-border market, the EU knows that is has comparable weight to China and America and can push back.