Pierre Kanuty, regional councillor for Île-de-France, says that this challenge for ‘in’ campaigners is to answer the demands of citizens without offering Eurosceptics an opportunity to frame the debate. This piece is part of the UCL European Institute’s first guest editor week on openDemocracy.

Brexit – Britain’s exit from the European Union – is more than a debate on the ‘special relationship’ between Britain and the European continent. This relationship has been difficult ever since Britain joined the European Community in the mid-1970s, a time when France was facing its first referendum on the question of Europe, because of the way this great nation sees herself in relation to Europe as a continent, on the one hand, and as a political and economic entity, on the other.