Britain’s decision to leave the European Union could inspire other disaffected nations to consider a way out unless the bloc responds to anxiety across the continent over jobs, immigration, and globalization.

While experts say an all-out breakup of the European Union is far-fetched, countries both successful (like Sweden) and struggling (such as Greece) may view the British experience as a model to change their own lots in life.

“There is a serious risk that Britain’s decision to withdraw from the European Union could set off similar demands on other member states,” said Michael Leigh, a senior fellow at The German Marshall Fund of the United States, adding:

It was clear even before the British referendum that the EU is facing a number of problems, and if the EU wishes to regain credibility in the eyes of the citizens of European countries, it must find a way to tackle its own disorders effectively, and demonstrate it can function properly.

Last week, Britain, the European Union’s second-largest economy after Germany, became the first to decide to leave the 28-member bloc.

Leigh, in an interview with The Daily Signal, said the European Union must not view Britain’s exit as a unique case, but rather, a consequence of populist anger that exists throughout the continent. That anger, he said, is fueled by unease that the global economy has created winners and losers, and that integration and bureaucracy may be making that gap harder to close.

According to experts, other member countries with large populations of people skeptical of the European Union—and also may demand a similar referendum—include France, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, Hungary, Poland, and Austria.

The European Union also faces other challenges, such as the refugee crisis sparked by refugees fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and North Africa; Russian aggression in Ukraine; and Greece’s faltering economy.

“We shouldn’t really expect the British referendum to be followed by this sudden surge of integration,” Leigh said:

That’s not realistic because there’s serious differences of views concerning the way forward. The main lesson EU leaders will have learned about the rise of populism is there is no expectation or demand for more Europe. As a result of the British experience, the people will be looking for pragmatic solutions and concrete projects to get out of this problem rather than some new commitment to a more united Europe.

The first big hint of how member governments view the British decision to exit the EU, known as Brexit, will come as they negotiate the terms of Britain’s position outside the union. Also not clear is whether they’ve learned lessons from the result of Britons’ vote.

In an emergency meeting over the weekend of foreign ministers from the European Union’s six founding states—Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands—leaders expressed a desire for Britain to quickly invoke Article 50, which would allow the process for severing ties to begin and set a two-year timeline for doing so.

Leigh, and other experts, say those favoring a fast resolution may try to impose harsh conditions on Britain, and limit its interaction with the bloc, in order to make an example of the British.

But other leaders, especially German Chancellor Angela Merkel, considered a key figure in rebuilding the EU, prefer a more patient approach so as to preserve the bloc’s integrity.

“The EU is liable to just bully Britain in order to discourage others from leaving,” said James Jeffrey, a former U.S. ambassador to Iraq who specializes in European security and political issues, adding:

That would be the wrong path to take because instead of discouraging the political class, they would really be discouraging the general population, which is fed up with business as usual inside the EU. So the EU could draw the wrong lessons from Britain’s exit.

Jeffrey, in an interview with The Daily Signal, cautioned European leaders to acknowledge the divide between the elite and masses, and seek to do something about it.

“This is a struggle between the cosmopolitan elite—not just bureaucrats but people who are successful in a modernized globalized economy in Europe and happy with the idea of an ever closer union—and others who want to stay a part of their own countries who have a patriotic feeling and don’t buy the EU’s goals,” Jeffrey said. “We have to reform the EU and water down this idea of a union and take effective action on immigration and address how to loosen the inevitable mountain of regulations that the EU puts on everybody, which just drives some people crazy.”

Ted Bromund, a Heritage Foundation expert on U.S. and British relations with the European Union, argues that though member countries have different conditions, their collective anxiety is animated by the European debt crisis that began at the end of 2009.

“Some nations, like Greece, feel that the EU is bossing them around politically and economically in a particularly brutal way,” Bromund wrote to The Daily Signal in an email:

In others, the slow growth—which a result partly of their own economic policies—is also reflected on the EU. So there is no one single answer [driving the unrest]. If I had to pick one, it would probably be the economic factors around the Euro, and the EU’s low growth; but they are all wrapped up together, and you can’t pull them apart.

Despite these ongoing challenges, the European Union is likely to limit decisive action as the two most powerful nations in the bloc, Germany and France, grapple with national elections in 2017. Leaders of those countries cannot afford to alienate the populist strands of the electorate.

So, as one expert predicts, the European Union—the world’s biggest single economic market—may trudge on for now, until something dramatic happens again.

“There is a deep taboo among member states leaving the EU,” said Tim Oliver, a professor who is the Dahrendorf fellow on Europe-North America relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

“The European institution is about moving forward, not backward,” Oliver told The Daily Signal. “Finding a united position is never easy for the EU on a good day, let alone when it is facing something like this. The EU has so far muddled through these challenges. They never solve them. They cope.” (For more from the author of “What Brexit Means for the European Union’s Future” please click HERE)

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Janet Yellen should send a note of congratulations to Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson, the British politicians most responsible for pushing the Brexit campaign to a successful conclusion. While she’s at it she should also send them some fruit baskets, flowers, Christmas cards, and a heartfelt “thank you.“ That’s because the successful Brexit vote, and the uncertainty and volatility it has introduced into the global markets, will provide the Federal Reserve with all the cover it could possibly want to hold off on rate increases in the United States without having to make the painful admission that domestic economic weakness remains the primary reason that it will continue to leave rates near zero.

For months the corner that the Fed has painted itself into has gotten smaller and smaller. It continues to say that rate hikes will be appropriate if the data suggests the economy is strong. Then its representatives continually cite (arguably bogus) statistics that suggest a strengthening economy, which cause many to speculate that rate hikes are indeed on the horizon. But then at the last minute the Fed conjures a temporary reason why it can’t raise rates “right now,” but stresses that they remain committed to doing so in the near future. But each time they conduct this pantomime, they lose credibility. Sadly, Fed officials are discovering that their supply of credibility is not infinite, even among those who would like to cut them a great deal of slack.

But the Brexit vote saves them from all this unpleasantness. Now when critics question the Fed’s unwillingness to deliver on the suggested rate hikes, given what they believe to be a strong economy, all the Fed needs to do is point to the “uncertainty” that will be in play now that the world’s fifth largest economy is disengaging from the European Union. And since this process is bound to be long, messy, and fraught with uncertainties (as there is no precedent for a country leaving the EU), this will be a handy excuse that the Fed will be able to rely on for years.

Brexit could also place severe strains and uncertainties on the global currency markets. The fear of financial losses could encourage investors to seek safe haven assets like gold and, at least for now, the U.S. dollar. Given that there is already much concern that the dollar is valued too highly against most currencies, and that this has created imbalances in the global economy, any surge in the dollar that results from Brexit may have to be fought by the Federal Reserve through lower interest rates and quantitative easing. This would rule out the potentially dollar-strengthening interest rate hikes that they supposedly planned on delivering. So as far as Janet Yellen is concerned, the British have given her the gift that keeps on giving.

On another level, the vote in the UK illustrates the fundamental inefficacy of the monetary and financial policies that have been implemented by the world’s dominant central banks and central bureaucracies. For years, global elites have been telling us that deficit spending, government regulation, and central bank stimulus is the best way to cure the global economy in the wake of the 2008 Financial Crisis. To prove these points, elite economists associated with the government, academia, and the financial sector have pointed to all kinds of metrics to show how their policies have been successful. But the man on the street perceives a very different reality. They know that their living standards have fallen, their cost of living has risen, and that their job prospects have deteriorated. They see a loss in confidence and economic stagnation when they are being assured the opposite.

This disconnect has fueled anti-establishment sentiment on both sides of the Atlantic. In the United States, it has given rise to the insurgent candidacies of both Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. The unexpected successes of both reflect a deep distrust of the establishment. Such discontent would not be in play if the positive stories being told by the elites had made any resonance with rank and file voters.

The same holds true with the unexpected strength of the anti-EU voters in Britain. The “Remain” camp had the support of virtually all the elite members of the major UK political parties, the media, and the cultural world. In addition, foreign leaders, including President Obama in a state trip to England, harangued British voters with warnings of economic catastrophe if the British were to make the grave error of defying the advice of their “best” economists.

Given all this, poll numbers that suggested the vote could be close had been dismissed. The elites, as evidenced by recent drifts in currency and financial markets, had all but assumed that British voters would fall into line and vote to remain. Instead, the people revolted. After having been misled for so many years by the very elites who urged them to remain, the rank and file finally asserted themselves and voted with their feet.

British voters may not know what they will get with an independent Britain, but they knew that something was rotten, not just in Denmark, but all over the European Union. The same holds true in the United States. Until our leaders can paint more realistic pictures of where we are and where we are going, we should expect more “surprises” like the one we got [last week]. (For more from the author of “BREXIT: Just What the Doctor Ordered” please click HERE)

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