Brexit and the Conservative Party

The vote for Brexit poses a fundamental challenge to Conservative statecraft, the most profound the party has faced since Edward Heath’s administration secured entry to the EEC in 1973. The referendum result was the central failure of David Cameron’s premiership, prompting his immediate resignation. It exposed the limitations of his efforts to modernise his party but also reflected deeper tensions that have animated Conservative politics throughout the democratic era. This chapter analyses these utilising Andrew Gamble’s (1974) conceptual framework of the politics of power and the politics of support. It argues that the conflict between the politics of support and the politics of power will pose major difficulties in party management terms for the Conservative leadership, and threatens the electoral coalition the party mobilised at the 2017 general election.