Trump & Brexit

The purpose of this blog is not to espouse any kind of ideology.  I just like to talk about ideas and document my random thoughts and insights.  So, although this post talks about some recent political events – it is not passing judgement on what people believe in or vote for.

(I kind of hate writing blog posts that need a disclaimer at the beginning, but I do want to keep this blog authentic and sometimes I may upset people when I do!  Sorry in advance!)

So, my random insight for the day is:

The reason people give for voting the way they do is a reflection of how much power they believe that the organisation / political party that they are voting for has.  

Looking at things through this prism shows that people are actually very logical and that there are very clear reasons people vote the way they do.

Recently in the political world there have been two major events that people are always talking about.  The first is Donald Trump being elected President of the greatest country in the world (yes, I honestly believe the USA is the best country in the world even though I’ve spent the majority of my life in England) and the way that the British public voted to leave the EU (aka Brexit).

It seems to me that these two events seem to be dealing with similar issues.

A vote for Donald Trump or Brexit represented more jobs for the public, better pay and conditions, less immigration and therefore more resources becoming available to the public.

Trump & Brexit

The question in my mind is whether President Trump or the Conservative Party in the UK actually have the power to act on these promises (let alone deliver).

To put this into perspective if you work in an organisation and the members of the board hold a vote where their employees could vote for more money, better conditions and less immigrants being employed, could the board deliver on this even if they really wanted to.  Probably not because the organisation is not a self contained entity.  It’s a small entity in a complex world with rules, laws and regulations.

This isn’t a blog post about globalisation per se – although this is one of the reasons the promises made by President Trump and The Conservatives may never be delivered, but it’s about the observation that the public generally believe that political parties have a lot more power then they actually do.

There is a tendency by the general public to blame the government whenever something goes wrong.  There is a lot that the government can do and a lot of blame can and should be placed on different governments.  But, the Government is the only institution that the general population can change with a simple vote.  This is the exact reason why so much anger and fear is directed towards governments – because they are visible to people who vote.  What isn’t visible to people are a lot of the strings attached to Governments – international pressure, powerful individuals, large corporations, international security etc that people can’t change with a vote.

When looking at things this way it’s interesting listening to why people voted  for and against Brexit.

People who voted for Brexit wanted more jobs (more jobs for working class people), more money, more public services (less immigrants = more resources) and more opportunities (more free places in schools and more jobs available in the market place).

People who voted against Brexit wanted more jobs (more trade = more money), more money, more public services (more wealth = more taxes = more public services) and more opportunities (millennials say their career options have been stifled due to the imminent restrictions on free movement through the EU for British people).

If the people who voted leave and remain for Brexit, voted for pretty much the same things, could it be that they voted for something which no government has control over?  I think so.  The world is changing at an incredibly fast pace in the same way it did during the Industrial Revolution due to the Industrial Revolution of today (aka a Technological Revolution in combination with globalisation, the growth of small businesses and the destruction of unions).

A vote for a change in government isn’t going to change – in contrary to what a lot of people believe – the tectonic shift that the world is going through today.