The Brexit story told in 5 animals from the Chinese Zodiac

By George ILIEV
Brexit Metaphor No 108.

The Chinese zodiac has 12 animals and the EU flag has 12 stars. The similarities end here.

The stars cannot tell a good story because they are all the same. While the animals are very different.

Here is the story of Brexit in five animals, with a divination twist at the end:
2016, Year of the Monkey: Brexit started with the EU referendum - after a campaign marked by shenanigans.
2017, Year of the Rooster: Theresa May triggered Article 50 - a wake up call.
2018, Year of the Dog: The Withdrawal Agreement went to the dogs with the biggest defeat in Britain's modern political history.
2019, Year of the Pig: Starting from February 5, we will all be wallowing in mud for a year, as this will be the Year of the Earth Pig.
2020, Year of the Rat: Guess what happens then! 
(Hint: the Global Financial Crisis started in the Year of the Rat 12 years earlier.)

Alternatively, if Chinese mythology has got its number wrong, the Pig and the Rat may descend upon us all at once, as the Juglar Cycle of economic activity and investment is up to 11 years long, while the planet Jupiter (after which the Chinese Zodiac cycle was fashioned) completes its rotation in 11.85 years.

So in the Brexit context, the phrase"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer" might warrant paraphrasing to: 

"Keep your zoos closed and your animals away from the bulldozer."

Chinese Zodiac (Source: Wikipedia)

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Notes:
1. Timeline: This article is part of a series of original #BrexitMetaphors published daily. A total of 108 have been posted so far and another 53 Brexit Metaphors will be published every day until the planned Brexit date of March 29, 2019.
2. Disclosure: The author has a master's degree in European Integration. He also thinks he knows a bit about business, economics, entrepreneurship, China, history, geography, nature, science and Rubik Cubes.
3. Invitation: If you'd like to contribute to the debate, please leave a comment below or re-tweet the blogpost link.
4. Sign-up: I would be thrilled if you signed up to receive my blog daily by entering your email address in the blank in the top right-hand corner of this page.
5. Thank you for being here!

Britain is a walnut that grew into a sapling; and then Brexit struck

By George ILIEV
Brexit Metaphor No 105. 

Once upon a time, there was a walnut that fell from a walnut tree. It had a protective shell so the worms couldn't eat it while it was lying on the ground. Time passed and the walnut germinated, so a thin sapling grew out of it. But then a herd of goats came and ate the sapling. End of story.

Britain is this walnut. It fell to the ground in 1973 when the UK joined the European Economic Community (EEC). This gave it access to a vast internal market so the walnut took root and germinated: in a few years the UK economy started recovering from the monicker "the sick man of Europe". Growth was maintained in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s and the shoot became a young sapling. A storm struck in 2007-2008 (the global financial crisis) but then a rainbow formed in the sky in 2012 (the London Olympics). So everything was starting to look great again until Brexiteers took power in 2016 and tramped on the walnut sapling. They didn't want a walnut to grow in their garden; they wanted to plant an English rose instead. A walnut tree, even though productive, was not welcomed as it cast a shadow, while an English rose would produce a fragrance that would waft halfway around the world.

Walnut (Source: Wikipedia)

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Notes:
1. Timeline: This article is part of a series of original #BrexitMetaphors published daily. A total of 105 have been posted so far and another 56 Brexit Metaphors will be published every day until the planned Brexit date of March 29, 2019.
2. Disclosure: The author has a master's degree in European Integration. He also thinks he knows a bit about business, economics, entrepreneurship, China, history, geography, nature, science and Rubik Cubes.
3. Invitation: If you'd like to contribute to the debate, please leave a comment below or re-tweet the blogpost link.
4. Sign-up: I would be thrilled if you signed up to receive my blog daily by entering your email address in the blank in the top right-hand corner of this page.
5. Thank you for being here!

Can rain be good for health and fog for navigation? - Brexit Britain might wonder

By George ILIEV
Brexit Metaphor No 101. 

Transitions are devilishly difficult. The transition of Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries to democracy, market economy and a non-Soviet-centred pattern of foreign trade took at least a decade in the 1990s and was accompanied by several years of recession. 

Brexit does not require changes in the underlying political and economic structure of Britain but a Hard Brexit will be accompanied by a change in the pattern of trade away from the EU. So, one out of the three major characteristics of the post-Soviet transition will be part of the post-Brexit transition of the British economy.

Two questions arise from this: if there is a recession in Britain, how deep and how long will it be? The recession in Britain during the Global Financial Crisis lasted 5 quarters (15 months) in 2008 and 2009, but in the subsequent three years (2010-2012) there were another 4 scattered quarters of negative GDP growth. So it wasn't until 2013, five years after the financial crisis, that the British economy started moving steadily towards economic recovery.

Britain may recover faster from a Hard Brexit if the global economy is healthy in the coming years. However, if China or the US start to sneeze, Britain will go down with a cold. And if the global economy is hit by another global recession as in 2008-2009, post-Brexit Britain may get an outright pneumonia. 

Did anyone really believe that being left out in the cold and in the rain would be good for your health. And did anyone believe that fog would be good for navigation?

Foggy weather (Source: Wikipedia)

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Notes:
1. Timeline: This article is part of a series of original #BrexitMetaphors published daily. A total of 101 have been posted so far and another 60 Brexit Metaphors will be published every day until the planned Brexit date of March 29, 2019.
2. Disclosure: The author has a master's degree in European Integration. He also thinks he knows a bit about business, economics, entrepreneurship, China, history, geography, nature, science and Rubik Cubes.
3. Invitation: If you'd like to contribute to the debate, please leave a comment below or re-tweet the blogpost link.
4. Sign-up: I would be thrilled if you signed up to receive my blog daily by entering your email address in the blank in the top right-hand corner of this page.
5. Thank you for being here!