In Brexit victory, a defiant protest against globalization

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The immediate shocks are still not known. But German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke for many when she said, "There is no point beating about the bush: today is a watershed for Europe, it is a watershed for the European unification process."

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or British society, this was much more than a response from the far-right, says Robert Colls, professor of cultural history at De Montfort University in Leicester, who was calling for a "Lexit," or a socialist response to Brexit, ahead of the vote. He says the choice to leave is a "late response to globalization" that has dislocated too many people and not been addressed by the Labour party, the majority of whose members backed the Remain camp.

The referendum itself, and the way it played out amid fear and falsifications, is also indicative of a broken system. "We haven't got a really good system for dealing with complicated matters," he says. "It has not been necessary for either side to say what will happen next. No one has had to spell it out. We just have to frighten each other."

For that reason he says he, like the majority who voted for Brexit, have no idea what to expect now. But they believe that they've actually made the more prudent choice with an EU they say simply does not work.