Nicola Sturgeon, MSP & Deputy First Minister
Independence: a renewed partnership of the Isles
Nicola Sturgeon MSP, Deputy First Minister
Date: Thursday 6th June 2013
Venue: Playfair Library Hall, Old College, South Bridge
Time: 6pm – 7pm
Please register for tickets at:
http://independencearenewedpartnershipoftheisles.eventbrite.co.uk
AQMeN
Through the Public’s Eye: Researching attitudes on Scotland’s constitutional future with the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey
The 2014 referendum on Scotland’s constitutional future has stimulated a vast amount of discussions. Many claims are made about what “Scots” want for the future, but too often these claims are not substantiated by empirical research. The Scottish Social Attitudes Survey (SSA) provides a valuable tool to assess the views of the public. In particular it can be used to track attitudes back to the late 1990s and analyse how the public’s views may have changed over time.
This one day event will showcase current research using this high-quality data source. In-depth findings on a range of topics will be presented by researchers from a variety of institutions in Scotland (both academic and policy-related). Research teams have worked together to provide responses to some of the most crucial questions about attitudes towards the constitutional future of Scotland – questions that will be important whatever the outcome of the referendum. In presenting their findings, these researchers will not only cast light on the current state of public opinion, but also examine how it has changed over the last 15 years.
This event will be highly valuable for anyone interested in the independence referendum and the future of Scottish public services and in particular public perceptions that shape the debates. It will also be useful for participants interested in the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey and its time series perspective. The event is open to practitioners and academics alike and does not require any prior knowledge.
Chair: Professor Susan Deacon, Assistant Principal, University of Edinburgh
External Speaker: Professor Charlie Jeffrey, University of Edinburgh
Coffee and tea will be served in the morning and afternoon and a lunch buffet will be provided.
Wednesday, June 19, 2013 – 10:00 to 17:00
AQMeN
Our Dynamic Earth, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh
Keynote Speaker: Professor Michael Ignatieff
Michael Ignatieff Lecture
‘The Crisis of Democratic Sovereignty’
University of Toronto / Harvard Kennedy School
23 May 2013, 5:30PM
Surgeon’s Hall, Edinburgh
Sponsored by The Global Justice Academy
Attendance is FREE. ALL WELCOME. Reception to follow
Conference also free for all Edinburgh participants – http://bit.ly/12mx5JC.
Registration with Simon.Kershaw@ed.ac.uk
Dr. Nicola McEwen, Academy of Government
The University of Edinburgh’s Dr. Nicola McEwen reflects on the implications of Ukip victories and the possibility of a referendum on EU membership for Scottish voters. This piece was originally published in the 14 May issue of the Scotsman.
Until last week, the risks and uncertainties highlighted in the referendum debate were stacked firmly on the Yes side.
The Scottish Government has been facing mounting pressure to answer questions on the implications of independence for a range of policies and cross-Border arrangements, from currency and pensions to defence and foreign affairs. None of these questions has a definitive answer. All are dependent on the outcome of negotiations, not just with the UK government but with the European Union, Nato and other international organisations. But raising the questions serves to augment the fear, uncertainty and doubt cast by those actively seeking to secure a No vote. The surge in support for Ukip in the recent local elections in England, and their strong performance in the South Shields and Eastleigh by-elections, has now turned attention toward some of the uncertainties surrounding a No vote, raising questions about the UK’s political and constitutional future.
Ukip’s success has already prompted a response from the UK government. Stricter immigration – the number one issue for Ukip voters – was at the centrepiece of last week’s Queen’s Speech at the State Opening of Parliament, with implications for who can work and access services across the UK. The Prime Minister, David Cameron, also felt compelled to reaffirm his commitment to hold an “in-out” referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU if re-elected to government in the 2015 General Election, amid pressures from his own back-benchers for an earlier poll.
Mr Cameron was forced to further clarify his position on this yesterday after Tory Cabinet ministers said they would vote to leave the EU as things stand. The prospect of an EU referendum raises the spectre that if Scots vote to maintain the Anglo-Scottish political union in 2014, it could involve withdrawal from the European Union.
Of course, the Conservatives would not be in a position to honour their EU referendum pledge if they were to lose the 2015 UK General Election. But it could become increasingly difficult for the other parties to resist similar pressures. There is strong support across the UK for an EU referendum, and the Conservatives are not the only party to face an electoral threat from Ukip. At the last elections to the European Parliament, when UKIP beat Labour into second place (in spite of coming sixth in Scotland), the British Election Study (BES) suggested that more Ukip supporters had voted Labour in the previous election than had voted Conservative. The BES monitoring survey also suggests Ukip is picking up support from disaffected Liberal Democrats. The European elections of May 2014 provide the next big electoral test. The issue of the UK’s future in or out of the EU, and the timing of a referendum on the issue, seems certain to stay close to the top of the agenda.
Scots, it seems, are more comfortable Europeans than their English counterparts.
The mere fact of holding an EU referendum does not guarantee that it would produce a vote for withdrawal. It is perhaps ironic that when, in January, Mr Cameron promised to hold a referendum on EU membership, the percentage of electors saying they would vote for Britain to leave the EU was outstripped by those who would vote to remain in the EU for the first time in over a year, according to the YouGov monthly tracker poll. More recently, though, support for leaving the EU is consistently ahead of support for staying – with a lead of between seven and 11 points.
Opinion in Scotland is markedly different. We may not be a nation of Europhiles, but an Ipsos-Mori poll in February suggested that a majority of Scots would vote for Britain to stay in the EU, outstripping those who would vote for Britain to leave by 19 points. Moreover, the poll showed a remarkable consistency of support for EU membership across most sections of society, and irrespective of party support – even Conservative voters in Scotland support Britain staying within the EU. Scots, it seems, are more comfortable Europeans than their English counterparts.
The consequences of UK withdrawal from the EU are at least as uncertain as the implications of Scottish independence. We might expect some form of agreement that continued to give the UK access to the single market, but the costs in terms of investment, trade, labour mobility and environmental and social protection are unclear, as are the implications of having to give up EU citizenship. The biggest potential losses may be in the capacity for influence within and beyond Europe, and yet the UK would still be affected by EU rules and decisions.
These debates on the UK’s future in Europe have become a key theme of the debate over Scotland’s future. In the past few weeks, several commentators have suggested that it could be a game-changer, shifting support towards a Yes vote to ensure Scotland remains within the EU.
The issue of the UK’s future in the EU has added an intriguing new dimension to Scotland’s referendum debate, raising yet more questions on the consequences of both a Yes and No vote. Whatever the outcome, we face an uncertain future.
There is no doubt that there are anxieties within civil society about the possibility of leaving the EU, and broad support within Scotland for EU membership whether or not Scotland becomes independent. But it is not clear that the threat of a referendum that could lead to withdrawal from the EU would outweigh the concerns or attachments that underlie the current inclination, according to opinion polls, towards a No vote in the independence referendum.
Moreover, the prospect of UK withdrawal from the EU also raises searching questions for the Yes campaign, especially when we consider the kind of independence being envisaged by the Scottish Government. The emphasis has been on a form of independence that would be embedded within the British Isles and the European Union. It is envisaged that Scotland and the rest of the UK would continue to share a currency, a common labour market, a common travel area, a shared electricity market, and a variety of other shared arrangements potentially including agreements on cross-border pensions and social security.
As it stands, many of these arrangements would require negotiated agreement not just with the UK government but also with the EU. For example, agreeing a common travel area with the rest of the UK would necessitate a negotiated opt-out from those aspects of the EU Schengen agreement pertaining to border control, visas and asylum. It is not too difficult to envisage such an agreement being reached while both Scotland and the rest of the UK remain within the EU – Ireland and the UK negotiated similar agreements on Schengen so as to maintain the UK-Ireland common travel area. But such agreements at the EU level could be more complex and politically difficult if the rest of the UK is no longer part of the EU family, especially if it imposed restrictions on EU citizens’ rights to live and work within its territory.
The issue of the UK’s future in the EU has added an intriguing new dimension to Scotland’s referendum debate, raising yet more questions on the consequences of both a Yes and No vote. Whatever the outcome, we face an uncertain future.
Dr Nicola McEwen is ESRC Senior Scotland Fellow, and director of Public Policy at the Academy of Government, University of Edinburgh.
AQMeN
The Future of Scotland: Attitudes of 14-17 year olds on the Scottish independence referendum
Wednesday, June 5, 2013 – 12:30 to 15:00
Hosted by AQMeN
Royal College of Physicians, 9 Queen Street, Edinburgh
During this event results from the first representative survey of 14-17 year olds in Scotland regarding the 2014 independence referendum will be presented. Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) a team of researchers from the University of Edinburgh has designed and conducted a Scotland-wide survey of this age group. The understanding of their views is crucial, considering the lowering of the voting age to 16 for the referendum which will see most people in this age group able to cast their vote. So far there has not been a comprehensive and representative survey of this group.
This event will provide the first opportunity to engage with the results from the breadth of themes covered in the survey. The project does not simply provide a poll on the main referendum question, but sets of questions addressing themes relating to:
The questions used in the survey are based on existing large-scale adult surveys, but have been piloted also in a school with 110 pupils allowing the research team to refine the questions to become more meaningful to young people. Some reflection on the views from those involved in the pilot will be presented as well. After the presentation of the results there will be substantial room for discussion and an outlook for further work with this data
Attendance is free for AQMeN members however, places are limited and you must register here.
Dr. Robert Zymek, University of Edinburgh
In the first of a series of monthly blogs on the independence referendum from Edinburgh University’s School of Economics, Dr. Robert Zymek weighs up the practical considerations around the currency arrangements of an independent Scotland.
The politics of Scotland’s currency arrangement pose a conundrum for advocates of independence. On the one hand, polls show overwhelming support among Scottish voters for keeping the pound. Chancellor George Osborne seized on this when, on April 23, he suggested that England, Wales and Northern Ireland could veto a currency union with a newly independent Scotland – a scenario that may deter potential Yes voters in next year’s referendum. On the other hand, retaining the pound may trap Scotland in an uneasy live-in arrangement with the rest of the UK. The No campaign has exploited this inconsistency, with Alistair Darling declaring that such a currency union would “undermine Scottish independence”. The SNP’s official response has been to argue that a formal currency union between Scotland and the rest of the UK – a so-called Sterling zone – would be in the interest of both countries if Scotland were to become independent. (See also Alex Salmond’s article in the 5 May 2013 edition of the Mail)
While the question of an independent Scotland’s choice of currency is hard to disentangle from political strategy as the referendum campaign heats up, it is clear that the eventual nature of the currency arrangement would have profound implications for the Scottish economy. In this post, I will explore the pure economic angle on this choice, conveniently leaving political and legal considerations aside.
In principle, Scotland could opt for one of three currency regimes: i) keeping the pound – unilaterally or as part of a formal currency union with the rest of the UK; ii) joining the euro; or iii) setting up its own currency. To evaluate these options, it is useful to refer to the “Theory of Optimum Currency Areas” which was developed by the Canadian economist Robert Mundell in 1961 (and which helped win him the Nobel Prize in 1999).
Such dynamic considerations mean that the optimal currency arrangements cannot be chosen based on historical market integration and business-cycle synchronisation alone. An independent Scotland’s choice of currency should also reflect its intended place among the economies of Europe.
Mundell showed that two regions were more likely to form an Optimum Currency Area (OCA) if they had strong trade and financial linkages, and if their cycles of boom and bust coincided. The first part of the argument is straightforward: the more two countries trade with one another, the more damaging is the risk of sudden movements in the exchange rate, and the more beneficial the stability guaranteed by a common currency. The second part follows from the fact that two countries which share a currency must also share a central bank: the bigger the differences in economic conditions in different parts of the currency area, the more difficult it is for the central bank to set interest rates so as to provide economic stability for the area as whole.
How can these criteria inform Scotland’s optimal currency choice? At present, the Scottish economy is much more tightly integrated via goods trade and capital flows with the rest of the UK than with the Eurozone. At the same time, there are major economic shocks – most notably a decline in the oil price – which could put Scotland’s business cycle out of sync with both regions. The question is how likely such shocks are. The diagram below illustrates this point. If the risk of an economic shock affecting Scotland alone is low (solid circles), Scotland and the rest of the UK may represent an OCA due to their strong economic linkages, but Scotland and the Eurozone may not. If the risk of a Scotland-specific shock is high (dashed circles), it may be best for Scotland not to share a currency with either region.
Even in the latter case, Scotland may prefer to be part of a Sterling zone rather than the Eurozone. Thanks to an open border and common language, Scottish workers can easily move Southward in search of jobs, and Scottish savers are heavily invested in English banks and companies. This insures firms and workers against an isolated downturn in the Scottish economy.
Closer social and economic ties can thus serve as a substitute for synchronised business cycles in a currency area. Yet these ties are themselves affected by currency arrangements: if Scotland were to ditch the pound and join the Eurozone, new economic links with its Euro partners would likely crowd out some of the current trade and migration between Scotland and the rest of the UK. Over time, Scotland and the Eurozone could gradually evolve into an OCA, while Scotland and the rest of the UK might grow apart. Similarly, an independent Scotland issuing its own currency (which should be called the “Bawbee”, according to economist John Kay, in reference to a coin first issued by James V) may drift away economically from both the rest of the UK and the Eurozone.
Such dynamic considerations mean that the optimal currency arrangements cannot be chosen based on historical market integration and business-cycle synchronisation alone. An independent Scotland’s choice of currency should also reflect its intended place among the economies of Europe.
Next month, my colleague David Comerford will take a closer look at the constraints a hypothetical Sterling zone would impose on Scottish fiscal and prudential policy after independence.
Dr. Robert Zymek is a Lecturer in Economics at the University of Edinburgh.
Dr. Gordon Pentland, University of Edinburgh
Dr Gordon Pentland, academic historian at Edinburgh University, reflects on the political role of commemorations in the referendum campaign, and the need for skepticism about the claims to history made by all sides.
The relationship between politicians and history is seldom brought into starker relief than over the vexed and related issues of commemoration and history education within schools. Both of these are likely to form a significant part of the background noise to the referendum debate as it develops. To take commemorations as an example, it did not take long after the referendum became a certainty for speculation to emerge that the Scottish Government would try to achieve some kind of ‘Bannockburn bounce’ by tying the date of the vote into the 700th anniversary of the battle. Now that we know the real date, of course, such speculations have been quashed. Nevertheless, the ambitious plans for the commemoration of the battle, with a new state-of-the-art visitor centre and the now compulsory creation of a ‘brand’ (inanely described by its architects as ‘a visual identity that was both brutal and playful, full of meaning yet instantly accessible, and fresh without eschewing tradition’) means that accusations that the SNP are seeking political capital from this particular aspect of the Scottish past are unlikely to disappear. As the digital clock counts down the 700 days to the 700th anniversary, claims that nationalists are somehow not to be trusted with history will provide a constant refrain in the independence debate.
history… is such a powerful resource that no one interested in political power and in mobilizing people can afford to give it up completely. All politicians, regardless of their affiliations… make claims to certain ‘national histories’, whether they are aware that they are doing so or not.
Such claims – echoing the late Eric Hobsbawm’s famous assertion that ‘no serious historian of nations and nationalisms can be a committed political nationalist’ – are apt to be far louder and shriller than any directed at countervailing commemorations. In particular, the ambitious plans to mark the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War surely represent an opportunity to underline a shared British experience if ever there was one and David Cameron has hailed: ‘A commemoration that captures our national spirit in every corner of the country’. This planned commemoration (much closer to the actual date of the referendum than the Bannockburn anniversary) has not attracted anywhere near the same level of grumbling in the press. The nature of the conflict – far closer in time and involving a far more profound and widespread sense of loss – makes it difficult, taboo even, to suggest that the motives behind or the effects of its commemoration might be construed as political. Whether intentional or not, however, all such events, which involve politicians, state bodies and claims to ownership and understanding of the past are inescapably political.
Indeed, such politicized debates over Scotland’s past and its relationship to the British past have become increasingly frequent since devolution and do not require events as starkly polarizing as Bannockburn or as transformative as the First World War to sustain them. One revealing example, which sits on the threshold between issues of commemoration and education, was a debate in the Scottish Parliament in 2001. The motion put was that the deaths of James Wilson, John Baird and Andrew Hardie – three men executed for their role in an abortive radical insurrection in 1820 – be incorporated into the education curriculum as a means of commemorating their sacrifice. In the subsequent debate, this event became a pivot for three competing narratives: the Nationalist (that these men should be commemorated primarily because they died ‘in the cause of Scottish self-determination’); the Labour (that they should be commemorated to demonstrate that ‘The real heroes in Scottish history are not the kings … but the ordinary working-class people’); and the Conservative (that they should not be commemorated because ‘we would be wise to teach the lessons that the nation has learned from that history rather than glorifying men who betrayed it’).
The point surely is that history (understood in its broadest sense as claims to knowledge about ‘the past’) is such a powerful resource that no one interested in political power and in mobilizing people can afford to give it up completely. All politicians, regardless of their affiliations to different political parties and positions, make claims to certain ‘national histories’, whether they are aware that they are doing so or not. And they make these claims as academic historians have increasingly moved away from their own traditional role in furnishing histories of the nation. So the advice from this particular academic historian is to treat all statements about history coming from the mouths of politicians and from ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ campaigns with a healthy skepticism. To be plausible, they must all have an kernel of truth in them; but they are far more likely to live up to Ernst Renan’s famous dictum that: ‘Forgetting, I would even go so far as to say historical error, is a crucial factor in the creation of a nation’.
Dr Gordon Pentland is a Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Edinburgh. He is author of The Spirit of the Union: Popular Politics in Scotland, 1815-1820, published in 2011.
The Political Histories of Modern Scotland with Professor Ewen A. Cameron
Date: Tuesday 7 May 2013
Time: 5:15 pm
Venue: Auditorium Lecture Theatre, Business School
The current debate on ‘independence’ for Scotland has provided a recent focus on the clash between nationalism and unionism. The lecture will argue that there is a danger that the nature of this debate leaves us with an overly narrow understanding of the richness of modern Scottish political culture. The lecture will explore the different traditions which have been evident in modern Scottish political history, the sources which historians have used to study them and the extent to which the recent emphasis on the imperial and global dimensions of Scottish history can be augmented by consideration of politics.
Dr. Andrew Neal, University of Edinburgh
In this piece, Dr. Andrew Neal argues that security is about the perception of threats, rendering an objective assessment of Scotland’s prospects for security impossible. However, he notes that an independent Scotland may emulate the UK’s expansive approach to secruity threats and risks or adopt a narrower approach.
An objective analysis of the prospective security situation of an independent Scotland is impossible. There is no objective or settled meaning to the term ‘security’, even in the current governmental and constitutional arrangements of the UK. It is thus not possible to simply produce an objective and comparative list of ‘threats’ to the UK and an independent Scotland. The real question is how governments perceive threats and what they attempt to do about them. The question is therefore not whether an independent Scotland would face different threats to the rest of the UK, but how the government of an independent Scotland would perceive threats and what it would attempt to do about them.
At present, the UK government does not have a coherent approach to ‘security’, and there is no reason to think that an independent Scottish government would be any different. Governments of modern states are sprawling, complex beasts. Getting them to do anything in a coherent, unified way is extremely difficult, especially on issues that span different parts of government, maybe even all parts of government.
Even in the constitutional status quo, it is not clear that current Scottish arrangements provide adequate scrutiny and oversight of every aspect of ‘security’ that could affect Scotland.
There are currently two interpretations of ‘security’ in play within the UK government: the narrow and the broad. The narrow interpretation adopts a traditional understanding of security, in which threats are foreign, military, and state-based. The corresponding parts of government in the Foreign Office, the Ministry of Defence and 10 Downing Street deal with those threats. The National Security Council chaired by the Prime Minister has largely focused on traditional foreign and defence issues, such as the Libyan intervention.
At the same, an alternative broad interpretation of security is being developed elsewhere in the UK government. The UK government’s counter-terrorism strategy document (CONTEST) lists 29 departments and agencies as playing a role in this strategy. The most recent version of the National Security Strategy (NSS) goes further by shifting from ‘security’ to an encompassing list of ‘risks’. These stretch from international terrorism and overseas military crises to border transgressions by illegal immigrants and disruptions to fuel and food supplies. The manifestation of this broad interpretation of security is that security is proliferating across all areas of government, far beyond the traditional narrow remit of foreign and defence policy.
Much hinges on the extent to which an independent Scotland would truly be an ‘independent’ state.
The conclusion we must draw is that there is no single meaning of security in the UK. The reality is that disparate parts of the government perceive ‘threats’ and ‘risks’ differently and develop policies to deal with them in a piecemeal fashion. Whether this is good or bad depends on ones’ view on the relative dangers of security threats on the one hand, or a unified security state on the other.
Would it be different in an independent Scotland? The Scottish government might not perceive threats and risks in the same way. Given the haphazard nature of threat perception in the UK, there is no reason to think that Scotland would independently come up with same list of threats and risks. Scottish politics has been less hostile to immigrants than Westminster politics. The Scottish government might not see immigration as part of the bundle of risks specified in the NSS that includes terrorism, organised crime and smuggling.
My current research on parliamentary security politics at Westminster analyzes this unsettled and changing state of security affairs. The uneven creep of ‘security’ across different areas of government is reflected in a larger number of parliamentary committees handling security issues. Half a dozen now do so regularly (Intelligence and Security, Home Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Defence, Joint Committee on Human Rights, Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy). At least half a dozen more discuss security questions on a less frequent basis (e.g. Lords Committee on the Constitution, Energy, Public Accounts, Energy and Climate Change, Science and Technology, Health). If we were to take the comprehensive list of risks in the NSS seriously, we could argue that every part of government and parliament will find itself dealing with security issues at some point.
Whatever ‘security’ is, it already reaches far beyond the ‘reserved areas of government’ that Holyrood currently leaves to Westminster (e.g. foreign affairs, defence, counter-terrorism). The proliferation of ‘security’ across Westminster has in no way been mirrored in Holyrood. Even in the constitutional status quo, it is not clear that current Scottish arrangements provide adequate scrutiny and oversight of every aspect of ‘security’ that could affect Scotland. Without knowing which new ministries and parliamentary committees an independent Scotland would create, it is difficult to know how ‘security’ would play out in the new constitutional context.
And what of a Scottish House of Lords or equivalent? The House of Lords has often put a brake on the excesses of security politics at Westminster, such as extended pre-charge detention for terrorist suspects. In large part this is thanks to the many lawyers and a scattering of former security officials in its ranks. We do not even know if an independent Scotland would have an upper house of parliament, but we can be certain that it would not be an unelected body of experts and political appointees like the Lords and so would probably not have the same legal and security expertise.
Much hinges on the extent to which an independent Scotland would truly be an ‘independent’ state. If it does not free itself from the current security model at Westminster, we can expect security to be a lengthening rope pulled in several different directions at once. If it does not depart radically from the current Holyrood model, we can expect a continuing lack of scrutiny and oversight. The question of security in an independent Scotland is not a question of what objective threats it would face. It is a constitutional question. The character of security in a modern state is a product of its constitutional arrangements. Leadership, officialdom, parliament; these all shape ‘security’ in different, conflicting ways. Sometimes security shapes them.
Dr Andrew Neal is a Lecturer at the School of Social and Political Science at the University of Edinburgh. He blogs at securitypolitics and tweets @andrewwneal.
Colin Fleming, University of Edinburgh
Dr. Colin Fleming writes on the possibility of Nato membership for an independent Scotland, noting that while Scotland could exist outwith Nato, independence outside the strategic alliance would come at a political and financial cost.
This week Nato are conducting joint operational exercises off the Scottish coast, from April 15-29. This comes just after the recent trip by Alex Salmond to America and his lecture to the US think-tank the Brookings Institute where the First Minister said that Scotland’s international partnerships would remain unchanged in the event of independence. The nation’s alliances with the US and other nations would endure while Scotland would become an independent and active member of organisations, ranging from the European Union and the United Nations to Nato.
However, Nato is correct not to publically signal that Scotland would simply join the alliance, not least because to do so would be to undermine the UK state – one of its key members. Rocking the status quo is simply not something the US or Nato will do at this stage. Yet, neither is this somehow an indication that Scotland would have trouble being admitted to the alliance should the Scottish public vote Yes in next year’s referendum.
Nato provides a security guarantee which Scotland could not attain on its own. Membership would also have the added importance of plugging Scotland into regional and international security networks, something that will be expected from us by the majority of European states. Scotland could exist without Nato – there is no immediate territorial threat to the nation – but to do so would be much more costly financially and would make it far harder for Scotland to integrate with its key partners – not least the rest of the UK (RUK).
Integration is important in terms of future defence-sharing prospects with RUK, as it is for its possible future relationship with the Nordic states. Nevertheless, just as there are incentives for Scotland to join Nato, so too are there significant reasons why Nato would want Scotland to become a member of the organisation. Not least, Scotland’s geostrategic position marks it out as a pivotal player with its own strategic interests in the Atlantic.
As Scotland sits in the middle of the North Atlantic it would be odd if it weren’t welcomed into the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. This area is increasing important when it comes to strategic interests globally due to the potential for security concerns relating to Russia and China. Our joining existing security networks – both transatlantic and regional, such as the Nordic Defence Coperation pact – will therefore be highly desirable to Scotland’s neighbours.
We should also not undervalue the importance of existing Nato infrastructure in Scotland which Nato will want to maintain. However, perhaps more important is Scotland’s ability to fill gaps in the existing security framework. The inclusion of Scotland is more likely to enhance the security of the North Atlantic area, and we would be an important partner for regional allies as well of the Nato alliance.
Put simply, the UK’s focus towards the Middle East has resulted in a security gap in the Atlantic. This security gap has been exacerbated by ongoing MoD austerity measures which have prioritised finances on fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan at the cost of a properly maintained readiness for maritime operations in the Atlantic. The early decommissioning of the Nimrod and its cancelled replacement has left a hole in intelligence and surveillance across the region which is easily exploitable for those with the know-how. Scotland could, and should, plug this gap in the event of independence. Indeed, at present this surveillance role is conducted by Nato, which currently operates Maritime Patrol Aircraft from Leuchers and Lossiemouth for this very purpose. It would be highly attractive for Nato to retain these assets post-independence. A properly conducted negotiation between Scotland and RUK, where Scotland does not try to diminish the UK’s current standing, could lead to Scotland filling an important function, which focuses north instead of south.
The SNP position, that an independent Scottish state will ban nuclear weapons from Scottish territory, reflects the mood of the Scottish public in regard its own position on nuclear weapons. However, Scotland being nuclear-free is unlikely to be a serious impediment to Nato membership. Norway and Denmark have also banned nuclear weapons and both are important members of the alliance – fulfilling key tasks in Afghanistan and Libya. Furthermore, Scotland’s refusal to host nuclear weapons on its territory – as long as it acts responsibly to the concerns of RUK – will be balanced by what it can offer elsewhere. In light of changing geopolitical interests to our north as well as south, Scotland would be a good bet for Nato.
Dr Colin Fleming is a Research Fellow in Politics and International Relations at the University of Edinburgh. This piece was originally published in the Sunday Herald on 14 April 2012.
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