Brexit Negotiations: Interests, Red Lines and Stumbling Blocks

Brexit will officially fall on 29 March 2019 at midnight, Brussels time, and will undoubtedly represents a milestone in the history of European integration: after long years of deepening and enlarging, this is the first time a sovereign member state will leave the EU. This article is a humble effort to provide an overview of Brexit, by identifying the interests and red lines of the EU and the UK, as well as pointing to the key elements of negotiations, as they are known at the time of writing, the end of May 2018. For the research primary and secondary sources have been analysed, and historical methodology has been combined with the critical analysis method to understand the background of the process and point to its main stumbling blocks. The paper concludes that despite apparent rigidities and deadlocks, mutual trust and goodwill, as well as time constraint and practical considerations, may help overcome divides and find technically workable solutions.