Even though “too early to tell” holds true in many respects, the British vote did put moral questions on the table and is a strong sign of political 'disbelief.' The thesis I want to put forth is that we see is the beginning of the democratic secularization of a political religion. What started as shared economic interests became a shared political vision. But the shared vision eventually became a political religion that now has to deal with the threat of secularization.
One of the moral questions on the table: What is the place of democracy on our moral landscape? Given that we have rival visions of a good life, both on an individual and a political level, how are we going to resolve these conflicting interests? Even among people who tend to share certain universal orientations like human rights and agree on the value of human dignity, there are still many conflicts in more practical matters. How can we settle our disagreement about the proper roads to “enhancing life”? The (in principle) endless exchange of arguments takes place in finite settings in which organizations like governments or a whole people make decisions. It took the various Christian traditions many centuries to discover and to accept that democracy (that is, free elections) is it the most peaceful and most effective way of reaching decisions with respect to our shared paths of shaping and enhancing our common life. In today’s failed states one key political problem is the refusal to accept of the result of elections.
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