The original European Economic Community went from a free trade association and a common market, the club of Rome in 1957, to the European Union, something akin to a United States of Europe, with a centralised bureaucracy and a parliament which passes laws usurping national laws. In the UK about 70% of national laws have been superseded by EU laws.
Needless to say, nationalists have been very unhappy with this process and it has led to major disfunction, particularly with the debacle over the Muslim invasion. Germany's Mama Merkel and Sweden have welcomed them in by the million, while nearly every east European state has been resolutely opposed to them, and Britain and France, both of which have their existing big Muslim problem, have half-heartedly said they will take 25,000 and 30,000 "refugees" respectively.
For A/NZ the traditional Commonwealth trade ties were severely disrupted by Britain's entry into the EEC in 1973 and forced both to seek new partnerships within Asia, particularly with Japan and China.
It's apparent that the progress of the EU has been towards a superstate akin to the USA, but without the linguistic and cultural unity that exists there. In fact almost the whole of European history has been a history of warfare between different kingdoms, fiefdoms and republics.
At present, the only west European countries not in the EU are Norway and Switzerland, both wealthy countries and in Switzerland's case, it has a long history of fierce independence and neutrality.
From an emotional stance we want to see a Brexit, but the complexities of what the consequences would be for Britain have yet to be analysed.
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