After three dramatic years of will-it-or-won’t-it, the United Kingdom will officially exit the European Union today (Jan. 31).
The actual day may feel a bit anticlimactic. That’s because, for most people, very little will change immediately. On Feb. 1, the UK will enter a transition period that will last until at least Dec. 31, 2020, and during which EU law will still apply in the UK. Travelers, workers, and criminals, for example, will be treated the same as they are now.
“[I]t will be business as usual for citizens, consumers, businesses, investors, students and researchers in both the EU and the United Kingdom,” the European Commission recently wrote in a statement.
And yet, many important changes will be set into motion. From 11 pm on Friday, UK nationals will no longer be EU citizens. The 72 British members of the European parliament will be out of a job. And the UK will no longer be represented in EU institutions. It may be surprising to some Brits just how deeply embedded they’ve been, and how much influence they’re losing. Here is a non-exhaustive list:
- European Atomic Energy Community
- European Parliament
- European Council
- Council of the European Union
- European Commission
- European Central Bank
- European Court of Auditors
- European External Action Service
- European Economic and Social Committee
- European Committee of the Regions
- European Investment Bank
- European Ombudsman
- European Data Protection Supervisor
- European Data Protection Board
- Computer Emergency Response Team
- European School of Administration
- European Personnel Selection Office
- Publications Office of the European Union
Under the Withdrawal Agreement, the UK agreed not to “participate in or nominate or elect members of the EU institutions, nor participate in the decision-making of the Union bodies, offices and agencies.” It can still be part of the more than 40 agencies that monitor and implement EU policies during the transition period, but it won’t have voting power in any of them. The UK has indicated that it will negotiate on a case-by-case basis in order to remain in some EU agencies, including the Education, Culture and Audiovisual Executive Agency, which manages the popular Erasmus+ study abroad program.
Today may not feel like dramatic change is taking place, but it is a truly historic moment. It marks the beginning of the end. There will be new borders erected, and new rules established, in the Old World —after Brexiteers finish partying in Parliament Square.