Young Scottish National Party Members’ Perceptions of Scotland and the United Kingdom

Abstract

This paper explores young Scottish National Party (SNP) members’ views of Scotland and the United Kingdom. It is based on the analysis of the results of an online survey and interviews with young SNP members about their political engagement and their understanding of national identity, which we carried out from 2018 to 2020. Our study focuses especially on how the members of Young Scots for Independence (YSI) and SNP Students, the youth and student wings of the SNP, perceive the Scottish nation and the UK. This paper reflects upon the way these young people define Scottishness and Scottish society. It also discusses the role of national identity in their campaign for independence. Do they want Scotland to leave the Union because they see themselves, and Scottish people as a whole, as different from other British people? Do they consider their relationship with people in the rest of the United Kingdom as a kind of ‘Us vs. Them’ dichotomy? What does living together mean for them? The present paper shows that most of the members of the SNP youth and student wings do not feel British. A huge majority of them see the UK as a union of ‘un-equals’, which is exclusive, not progressive, and where Scotland’s voice is not heard enough. Besides self-determination, it is in the name of social democratic values that they campaign for Scottish independence. Significantly, social democracy is at the heart of their definition of the Scottish nation.