The June referendum vote in the United Kingdom to leave the European Union has given way to serious conversations among politicians, academics, business owners and civil society members around the world about how best to move forward.
At the foundation of my thoughts on this issue is my respect for the will of British voters to chart their own course. The United Kingdom is one of the closest allies and partners of the United States, and I know we will continue to have a strong and special relationship with Great Britain.
The immediate, most concrete impact on citizens of the U.K. has been economic: The vote has made them poorer as the pound has fallen to a 35-year low, and they could face a recession. Globally, uncertainty about the future continues to trouble investors.
More broadly however, I am concerned about the potentially far reaching geopolitical implications of the decision. The victory of the ‘Leave’ campaign reflects a dynamic playing out around the world, one which challenges the value of stable democratic institutions that the United States and our partners in the international community believe are important to promote peace, prosperity, security and universal norms and values. These institutions are under growing pressure both internally from citizens who question their value and externally from autocratic and revisionist forces.
There is little debate that Euro-Atlantic institutions have maintained peace and security in Europe and elsewhere since the end of World War II. Three times in the twentieth century alone, Europe was divided by war and rivalry. Today, Europe faces its challenges, but thanks to the progress in creating a stable and free Europe through such institutions as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the European Union, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, a Europe re-divided by closed national boundaries is harder to imagine.
Hard, but not impossible — for that is precisely the risk that we run if these institutions falter and fray. That is the aim of some actors in the international system who seek to undo this progress that has led to increased security and increased prosperity for tens, indeed hundreds, of millions of people. These institutions are not perfect — far from it — as the refugee crisis currently overwhelming the Middle East and Europe can attest. But they give us the tools and mechanisms needed to reason together through the lens of shared values, and to develop pragmatic solutions to global challenges.
The U.S. cannot solve the world’s problems all on its own, nor should we want to. But the U.S. must lead. We have an obligation to stand with our European friends in support of the principles that we all share: Democracy and the rule of law, respect for human rights, economic prosperity, peace and security.
We must lead an effort to reinvest time, resources and diplomatic energy into tools and structures that are values-based, that protect the rule of law, and that objectively help the United States and countries around the world be safer, more prosperous, and more interconnected.
One only need look at Russia’s destabilizing activities in Ukraine or their intimidation of Eastern European nations that seek strategic alignment with the West through NATO or the EU. Similarly, China has engaged in aggressive maritime claiming activities throughout the Asia Pacific region and has willfully worked to break the functioning of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which has fostered greater diplomacy and economic ties throughout the continent. And any hope to bolster democracy and respect for human rights in Venezuela will require the stepped-up engagement of all the members of the Organization of American States.
Lastly, combatting and defeating the Islamic State, a global threat, requires enhanced military and diplomatic coordination including pushing for reforms in many Middle Eastern countries. While they continue to lose physical ground, we see this depraved terrorist organization kill, maim and threaten many thousands of lives and in the last few weeks alone, has unleashed horror from the Bosporus to Baghdad to Bangladesh.
The U.S. should lead the way, but only by working together can democratic countries address these destabilizing dynamics. I hope that the U.K. referendum will serve as a wake-up call for leadership around the world. We need to understand why citizens have grown increasingly disenchanted with long-standing institutions they feel have fallen short — governments, legislatures, international organizations, corporations, even religious institutions. And we need to help citizens better understand that greater coordination and understanding among countries helps the United States remain safer and positions us to achieve our objectives here at home and around the world.
I am committed to doing just that. Because in a world of nation states, it is our mutual values and norms that will serve as the tools to advance our shared global goals and effectively combat our shared global challenges.
Ben Cardin is a U.S. senator from Maryland and the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Thinking of submitting an op-ed to the Washington Examiner? Be sure to read our guidelines on submissions.
