The “Do or Die” Mentality: Boris Johnson’s Suspension of Parliament from a Game Theorist’s Perspective
Brexit: we all know what it is and its implications for the global economic stage. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has declared that he intends to leave the EU on October 31st, desirably with a deal set forth but will do so even if such a deal does not exist. In the Guardian article “Boris Johnson in Final Push to Ram through Brexit Deal”, the authors discuss how Johnson has been asking for Members’ of Parliament support in two major votes this week: the vote on the withdrawal agreement itself and the vote to push the decision through the House of Commons next Thursday the 31st. Johnson assures that the deal will allow Britain to leave “without disruption and provide a relationship based on free trade and friendly cooperation”. Johnson’s request from MPs is interesting considering how the Prime Minister had planned to suspend Parliament twice in the past two months.
If we are to look Johnson’s plan to suspend parliament from a game theorists perspective, we can see that the ‘game’ was defined as whether Johnson was bluffing that he would have the UK leave the EU with or without a defined plan. He had to convince the public, Parliament, and the EU itself that he would in order to bring the EU back to the bargaining table. The UK Supreme court decided that Johnson’s 5-week suspension of Parliament in September had been unlawful. Yet, earlier this month, he attempted to do so again as discussed in the CNN article “UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson Plans to Suspend Parliament Again”. It could be argued that Johnson’s concentrated efforts to leave the EU by the October 31st deadline are emblematic of his adoption of the “madman” theory in which a player raises the stakes in conflict in effort to get the other side to back down.
We will see in the coming days if this strategy has paid off; even though he was not able to suspend Parliament, he still has support from many officials and could very well secure the withdrawal vote, leaving him in a decent position to make the Oct. 31st deadline.
Articles used:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/oct/21/boris-johnson-in-final-push-to-ram-through-brexit-deal
https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/02/uk/uk-parliament-prorogue-queen-speech-gbr-intl/index.html