Picture Courtesy: www.ip-watch.org

On June 24th, 2016, Britain held a referendum to decide if the nation would remain in the EU (European Union) or not. In what was one of the biggest political upheaval in European history, Britain abandoned 50 years of foreign policy, turning its back on the EU as 51.9% of the voters voted for Britain to cut ties with the European Union after a lengthy and bad-blooded referendum campaign.

The immediate consequence? Prime minister David Cameron resigned from his role as the PM and Britain's currency(Sterling) value plummeted to an all-time low in the global market within a few hours of the results sending shock waves throughout the globe. So the question the world is asking is: What on Earth just happened? When you take into account that Britain's exit from the EU, or Brexit, was backed by just a quarter of the government members, you realize that it was all the common people's decision.

The main reason for people voting to exit was that they wanted independence. By being a member of the EU, people of Britain had to follow rules made by leaders that they did NOT elect and could not remove. The main talking point is that now, immigration of people in and out of Britain is completely in the hands of its government and not the EU. However, looking at the bigger picture, many big industries that were established in Britain who had funding from other EU nations are expected to suffer from huge losses - a problem that the central banks of Britain will struggle to deal with.

The outrage among the youth was because of the fact that across the U.K., polls showed that only about 19% of people between the ages of 18 and 24 supported a British exit from the E.U. Among pensioners (ages above 50), who came of age before the E.U. was created, a staggering 59% wanted their country to leave. So the youth have voiced their opinion that essentially their elders had decided their future for them and that the people who voted for an exit won't even live to see the consequences.

If Britain as a nation manage to hold out in this period of turmoil and set the foundations for a stable future, this decision to opt out of the EU could reap its rewards for the future generations. However, if the economy continues to drop at the current rate and with no European sponsors to call out for help, the nation could easily be looking forward to one of its most tumultuous periods in it's history.