BREXIT has not yet not happened.

But the year since Britain voted to leave the European Union has been one of the most economically and politically tumultuous in post-war history. Events have moved so fast since this time last year many of us – including our political leaders – have struggled to keep up.

The last 12 months has taught us that cutting ties with a decades-old trading and regulatory bloc, was not going to be as easy as had been suggested. Britain’s relationship with the EU, on so many levels, can be summed up by the corny one-liner status update on Facebook: “It’s complicated.”

Last November, in our Beyond Brexit series, The Herald tried to begin to make sense of this unfamiliar complexity. After a campaign in which it was declared that the “people have had enough of experts”, we decided to seek out the insight of those in the know and let them air their insight on our pages.

The result was analysis which changed political agendas. We heard how Scotland could – despite cynicism – keep some relations with the EU after Brexit, but also how a new rhetoric on a “UK single market” might see a clawback of devolved powers.

Now, with the anniversary of last year’s referendum looming, we think the time has come to take stock of this incredible year and see how Britain, Scotland and all our futures have changed.

In politics, the year has brought a new UK prime minister, Theresa May. She – and her Scottish counterpart Nicola Sturgeon – became the voices of the first uncertain months after the vote. Ms May set out what she called a “red, white and blue” Brexit, a hardline approach severing more than mere political ties. Ms Sturgeon made detailed proposals for the kind of differentiated arrangements with the EU first identified in The Herald. When these were rejected she raised the prospect of a second independence referendum.

This month’s General Election confounded both women. Ms May’s hand is now weakened after her Tories faltered in England. Ms Sturgeon’s hand was weakened after her party faltered in Scotland. So the Prime Minister begins detailed negotiations on the UK’s exit without a clear mandate for her stance or a majority in Westminster to back it up. And the First Minister looks on, denied, it seems a place at the negotiating table, and with her core policy, a vote for independence after the final deal is settled, now looking unlikely.

Currency traders were the first to figure the dangers of Brexit as news of the 52 per cent win for Brexit broke, sterling crashed. It has roller-coasted ever since. But £1 now only buys $1.27 or so. On the morning of June 23, 2016, the figure was $1.48. This drop – taking Sterling to a 31-year-low – has coloured the entire year.

It has fuelled a rise in the shares of firms denominated in pounds but pushed inflation up to nearly three per cent a year.

This is on top of Britain’s long-standing disproportionate exposure to the financial crisis of a decade ago. Real incomes for real people in the UK are around 10 per cent lower than they were back in 2008. Only Greece fared this badly. Earlier this month the EU published official figures for growth in each of its (still) 28 members. Britain came last.

Did the economic fragility pave the way for that Brexit vote? Maybe. But forecasters predict even more economic weakness, with all the consequences. NIESR, the National Institute for Economic and Social Research, reckoned last year’s vote would stunt the British economy by the equivalent of one per cent of gross domestic product in 2017. That is before we actually leave. Afterwards? Well, NIESR’s best case is that consumption will drop four per cent by the end of the next decade compared with staying in the EU. The think-tank fears the number could top nine per cent. That is an average cut in spending of between £900 and £2,000 per person by 2030.

Here in Scotland the Fraser of Allander Institute reckons we should brace ourselves for doom and gloom. Scotland’s GDP could shrink by five per cent in a decade, costing 80,000 jobs.

So economists, dismissed as scaremongers, think things will get bad, they are just now sure how bad. There are too many unknowns. How far will immigration fall? What will new trade deals – and new rules – mean for vital industries like farming and fishing? And what kind of place will Britain, still the planet’s ninth biggest economy in real terms, at least according to the latest IMF numbers, carve itself?

Europe has not quite given up on the UK, as evidenced by the affectionate support for London and Manchester after this spring’s terror attacks. But Britain’s image has spiralled this year. The continent’s biggest tabloid, Germany’s Bild, summed up just how much nearly a year ago today. Setting the tone for 12 months of coverage across Europe, the paper reported the Brexit vote with resigned horror. “There we have it,” it said. “The British are crazy.”