Stands Scotland where it did?

Abstract

For a brief period in September 2014, the Scottish referendum was front-page news around the world. Although the campaigns for and against independence had been running in Scotland for 2 years, an opinion poll 2 weeks before the vote, suggesting a narrow Yes victory, unleashed a torrential rearguard action by UK supporters of the No campaign, including the three main UK political parties, banks, businesses, world leaders, assorted celebrities, and, with the exception of the Sunday Herald , every Scottish and UK national newspaper. Two days before the referendum, the Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister, and Leader of the Opposition, signed a ‘Vow’, on the front page of the Daily Record , promising increased, unspecified, devolved powers for the Scottish parliament, should there be a No vote. Emerging from political hibernation, former Prime Minister Gordon Brown rediscovered himself as a barnstorming orator, advocate, and guarantor of the Vow in the final days of the campaign. In this way, ‘Devo-max’, or enhanced powers for the Scottish parliament, which the Prime Minister had vetoed as a third referendum question, returned to the agenda after postal voters, comprising one-sixth of the electorate, had …