Staring Into Brexit's Abyss
At 12:30 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon, Sir Tim Barrow, the U.K.’s permanent representative to the EU, will hand-deliver a letter from British Prime Minister Theresa May to the office of European Council President Donald Tusk in Brussels, officially notifying the European Union of the U.K.’s intention to leave the 60-year-old bloc. The delivery of that letter will trigger Article 50, the statute of the EU Lisbon Treaty governing the procedure for the withdrawal of a member state.
The highly anticipated—and, for many, much-dreaded—“Brexit day” has been the subject of endless agonizing and political maneuvering since long before last Monday, when May announced the specific date upon which she will begin the years-long process of removing the U.K. from the EU. Yet many analysts say Wednesday’s invocation of Article 50, the first time a member state has ever signaled its intention to leave the EU, will be uneventful.
“On the one hand it's a really big step—it means that
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