Scottish Elite Research Articles

Scotland's Regional ambassadors? Assessing the Presence and influence of Scottish Elites in British Political Institutions

Are Scottish politicians regional ambassadors for Scotland in British institutions? This study explores the presence and influence of Scottish cabinet ministers and members of parliament (MPs) in British politics from 1945 to 2020. The paper shows that the traditional overrepresentation of Scots in Westminster ended in 2005. Scottish MPs have reached key positions in the House of Commons under Labour governments but disappeared almost completely from the front bench after 2010. Meanwhile, contributions by Scottish MPs have focussed heavily on issues that relate specifically to Scotland. Nevertheless, in the case of Whitehall, the article observes a limited presence and policy impact of Scottish ministers over the whole period, except under the Blair and Brown premierships. The only regular position reached by Scottish ministers has been that of Secretary of State for Scotland. However, the de-activation of the Scotland Office after devolution and the lack of Scottish Conservative ministers have limited the voice of Scotland in the executive. In summary, the British system of territorial recruitment ensures a minimum representation, but not necessarily an influence, of territorial minorities like the Scots.

Changing places: comparing 1986 and 2019 elites in Scotland

How are Scottish elites educated? Is Scotland simply England writ small with Oxbridge and private schools predominating? Do private day schools mainly in the cities provide the core of elites? How important are education authority schools? How have patterns changed, if at all, between 1986 and 2019? Using ‘ Who's Who in Scotland’, this article charts the changing composition of elites especially among the political, legal and administrative classes in Scotland in comparison with business and ‘traditional’ elites. Drawing comparisons with analysis of British elites more generally, it appears that Scottish elites are educationally more ‘Scottish’ and state-educated today than they were in 1986.

Defending Political Theory After Burke: Stewart's Intellectual Disciplines and the Demotion of Practice.

To subject politics to "theory," "metaphysics," or "speculation" was disreputable in 1790s Britain, owing largely to the success of Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), which linked these practices with enthusiasm. This fact is well established, but less studied are the means by which those committed to these forms of inquiry defended their intellectual conduct. Dugald Stewart's Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind (1792) was a pedagogical text that instructed the Scottish elite on how to govern their faculties; it was also a riposte to Burkean prudence, portraying the veneration of practice as theoretically naive.

Determinants for table tennis performance in elite Scottish youth players using a multidimensional approach: A pilot study

ABSTRACTThe purpose of the study is to explore whether a multidimensional profiling approach can be useful in predicting a table tennis player’s actual and future (one year later) performance. Data on anthropometrics, age from peak height velocity, motor-skills, psychological skills and training histories were gathered among Scottish elite youth male table tennis players (n = 14). Significant correlations emerged between: (a) actual performance rating and age from peak height velocity (r = .71), sprint test (r = -.69), number of years of practice (r = .84), positive refocusing (r = -.58), and self-regulation in learning – self-monitoring (r = -.60), and evaluation (r = .57); (b) performance rating one year later and positive refocusing (r = -.58), self-monitoring (r = -.50), and number of years of practice (r = .80). Results also showed significant correlations between progression scores (2017 rating score minus 2016 rating score) and age from peak height velocity (r = −0.77), sprint test (r = .63), number of years of practice (r = -.52), self-monitoring (r = .69), and evaluation (r = -.58). These results provided preliminary evidence for the usefulness of a multidimensional profiling approach for predicting performance and progression in youth table tennis players.

Planning the new industrial nation: Scotland 1931 to 1979

Despite the continuing strength of Unionist politics in Scotland, from the inter-war economic crisis onwards, there slowly emerged distinctive understanding of a Scottish industrial economy. Aided by administrative devolution, and from the 1940s by a UK-wide turn towards economic planning, a project aimed at a planned modernisation of Scottish industry gained increasing traction. This article focuses on the activities of the technocratic elements of the Scottish elite, the civil servants and academic economists who played a key role in conceptualising and quantifying the Scottish economy, and making and applying policy to develop the Scottish industrial nation between the 1930s and 1970s.

Living on the Level: Horizontally-planned Lodgings in Fifteenth- and Early Sixteenth-Century Scotland

Horizontally integrated public spaces and private accommodation in enfilade (i.e. entered in sequence one from another) were presented by Charles McKean as the successor in Scottish elite planning from around the 1520s to the vertically disposed provision of earlier towers.1 Architectural innovation there certainly was in what is often labelled Scotland's early Renaissance period, and the efflorescence of buildings of this basic plan within houses of the Scottish nobility from the late 1530s onwards suggests an enthusiastic embracing of the new prescription for elite living that it offered. This article argues, however, that, rather than being a new departure of the 1500s, such buildings were present by the later fifteenth century, already forming the principal apartments of major courtyard ‘palace’ complexes in both royal and lordly contexts, and as an architectural expression of power they have too often been literally overshadowed by towers.

New Scots and Migration in the Scottish Independence Referendum

This article explores how the issue of immigration was debated by Scottish and UK political actors during the Scottish independence referendum. It considers the longer-term positions of Scottish elites on immigration, before focussing on the ways in which the Yes camp's liberal, multiculturalist approach contrasted sharply with the more restrictive, assimilationist position of the UK Government. The article concludes by considering Scottish voter attitudes towards immigration, before reflecting on the reasons why Scottish parties have adopted a welcoming approach to New Scots.

Scottish football before 1914: an economic analysis of a gate-money sport

On the basis of data collected at club level, it can be suggested that most Scottish elite football teams were not profit-maximizers. The lack of price competition, the existence of free entry for some spectators, the playing of uneconomic friendly and minor cup fixtures, the relative under-utilization of ground facilities, and the employment policies and wage structures of clubs point to utility taking precedence over profits. Even if the clubs had been profit-maximizers, this would have required collusion at the Scottish Football League (SFL) level in order to produce uncertainty of results at both match and championship level, but the members of the SFL seem to have been willing to tolerate a high degree of inequality in playing success.

Gender power in elite schools: methodological insights from researcher reflexive accounts

The main task of this paper is to understand the methodological insights from researchers’ reflexive accounts about the production of gender in the specific practices of three Scottish elite schools. Accordingly, the paper poses three questions: How is gender re/constructed through the specific practices of these elite schools? What insights into these specific school gender regimes are offered in researchers’ reflexive accounts? What methodological insights are gained for future such studies? The paper opens with a discussion of gender policy in Scotland which suggests that the country’s policy and governance take little account of gender, equality and in/exclusion issues, in particular their intersectional nature. The methodology for the wider study from which this paper emerges is then outlined followed by the methodology for this researcher reflexive sub-study. Then, the data relating to the three schools’ gender practices’ regimes and the researchers’ reflexive data are presented and analysed. The paper concludes by delineating a number of important gender power issues which the researcher reflexive accounts highlight and argues that the insights thus gained will aid the development of gender and power sensitive methodology.

The Scottish Connection with India 1725–1833

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how the Scottish elite, having taken advantage of opportunities provided by the 1707 Union with England, was then encouraged to spread eastwards, with the East India Company (EIC) as the vehicle. This progression was initiated in 1725 by a Westminster government headed by Walpole. He used the patronage provided by the monopoly to consolidate Whig political management of Scotland. Ministries, thereafter, also found this system very useful. This explains why there were so many Scots employed by the English EIC and its shipping for most of the eighteenth century and into the nineteenth. Their numbers were further boosted, from 1784, by the favours conferred, and the scheming, of Henry Dundas, Viscount Melville head of the new India Board. These Scots would play an extraordinary part in propagating the British Empire in India, the East Indies and China. An unlooked for, but very welcome additional benefit, concerns the riches these people brought back to Scotland. This wealth had a major impact on Scotland’s economic infrastructure. It is also argued that the East India patronage system helped dampen Jacobite and Scottish nationalist sentiments and that together with the bonds formed with the English elite and commercial classes—through wealth-seeking in the Indies—use of this patronage helped bring stability to the new concept of a “Great Britain”.

Intimacy and the Life Cycle in the Marital Relationships of the Scottish Elite during the Long Eighteenth Century

Traditionally marriage has been treated as one step in the life cycle, between youth and old age, singleness and widowhood. Yet an approach to the life cycle that treats marriage as a single step in a person’s life is overly simplistic. During the eighteenth century many marriages were of considerable longevity during which time couples aged together and power dynamics within the home were frequently renegotiated to reflect changing circumstances. This study explores how intimacy developed and changed over the life cycle of marriage and what this meant for power, through a study of the correspondence of two elite Scottish couples.

East India Patronage and the British State: the Scottish Elite and Politics in the Eighteenth CenturyGeorge McGilvary. London and New York: I.B. Tauris, 2008. xv + 288 pp. $85 (hardcover).

East India Patronage and the British State: the Scottish Elite and Politics in the Eighteenth CenturyGeorge McGilvary. London and New York: I.B. Tauris, 2008. xv + 288 pp. $85 (hardcover).

East India Patronage and the British State: the Scottish Elite and Politics in the Eighteenth CenturyGeorge McGilvary. London and New York: I.B. Tauris, 2008. xv + 288 pp. $85 (hardcover).

<b><i>East India Patronage and the British State: the Scottish Elite and Politics in the Eighteenth Century</i></b>George McGilvary. London and New York: I.B. Tauris, 2008. xv + 288 pp. $85 (hardcover).

Disconnect between standardized field‐based testing and mannitol challenge in Scottish elite swimmers

Elite swimmers have high rates of rhinoconjunctivitis and exercise-induced bronchoconstriction. Moreover, exposure to chlorine and chlorine metabolites is known to induce bronchial hyper-reactivity. To assess the early and late effects of chlorine and exercise on the unified airway of elite swimmers, and to compare the response to mannitol and field-based exercise challenge. The Scottish national squad underwent exhaled tidal (FE(NO)) and nasal (N(NO)) nitric oxide measurement, peak nasal inspiratory flow (PNIF), and forced expiratory volume in 1 s before, immediately after, and 4-6 h post-swimming. A sport-specific exercise test was carried out during an intensive lactate set (8 min at >/=80% maximum hear rate). All swimmers underwent mannitol challenge, and completed a health questionnaire. N=61 swimmers were assessed: 8/59 (14%) of swimmers had a positive mannitol challenge. Nine out of 57 (16%) of swimmers had a positive exercise test. Only one swimmer was positive to both. Swimmers with a positive mannitol had a significantly higher baseline FE(NO) (37.3 vs. 18.0 p.p.b., P=0.03) than those with a positive exercise challenge. A significant decrease in FE(NO) was observed pre vs. immediate and delayed post-chlorine exposure: mean (95% CI) 18.7 (15.9-22.0) p.p.b. vs. 15.9 (13.3-19.1) p.p.b. (P<0.01), and 13.9 (11.5-16.7) p.p.b. (P<0.01), respectively. There were no significant differences in N(NO.) Mean PNIF increased from 142.4 L/min (5.8) at baseline to 162.6 L/min (6.3) immediately post-exposure (P<0.01). Delayed post-exposure PNIF was not significantly different from pre-exposure. No association was found between mannitol and standardized field-based testing in elite swimmers. Mannitol was associated with a high baseline FE(NO); however, exercise/chlorine challenge was not. Thus, mannitol may identify swimmers with a 'traditional' inflammatory asthmatic phenotype, while field-based exercise/chlorine challenge may identify a swimmer-specific bronchoconstrictor response. A sustained fall in FE(NO) following chlorine exposure suggests that a non-cellular, perhaps neurogenic, response may be involved in this group of athletes.

Restoration: Charles II and his Kingdoms, 1660–1685 by Tim Harris; and Revolution: The Great Crisis of the British Monarchy, 1685–1720 by Tim Harris

86 TIM HARRIS. Restoration: Charles II and his Kingdoms, 1660–1685. London: Allen Lane, 2005. Pp. xxi ⫹ 506. $25 (paper). TIM HARRIS. Revolution: The Great Crisis of the British Monarchy, 1685–1720. London: Allen Lane, 2006. Pp. xviii ⫹ 622. $25 (paper). Mr. Harris’s new history of the Glorious Revolution covers all three kingdoms with Scotland and Ireland given almost equal weight with England. The books stress the political participation of the common people. Scotland is better covered than Ireland, but both narratives are written in the voices of the dominant Protestant Episcopalian elites. Dissident Presbyterians in Scotland since they were often in rebellion receive more attention than their counterparts in Ireland , but in neither case is the narrative in their voices. The Catholics of Ireland, who were three-fourths of their country, are even more summarily treated. The first volume tries to establish popular political participation from the evidence of books and pamphlets, the hearing of sermons, and participation in street demonstrations. But most works were written and printed in England, and the literacy rates cited are English. How remote all of this must have been from illiterate Irish speaking peasants. Mr. Harris examines disaffected public comments by the poor, but not many sermons . He covers processions in the streets and the lighting of bonfires well, scrupulously showing that these were often inspired by the elites. Revolution claims that popular participation can be found in local officeholding (one in 20 at all times in England), but the narrative falls back on stories of rioting. Part One of Restoration shows that the general enthusiasm for Charles II’s restoration was frittered away over the next twenty years, ending in the crisis of the Popish plot and the Whig attempt to exclude from the throne the King’s Roman Catholic brother James. Part Two describes the Tory revival of the last six years of Charles’s reign which left him more nearly absolute than any other British monarch of the century. Restoration in England with its population of 5.5 million was less complex than in much smaller Scotland (1.5 million) or Ireland (1.7 million). In England, ten percent of the clergy could not accept the restored Church of England, and several thousand nonconformists died in prison. In Ireland, the Catholic majority had been dispossessed from owning 60 percent of the land in 1641 to nine percent in 1660. The new regime restored a third of this land, but without toleration for Catholics. In Scotland the reestablishment of episcopacy drove a third of the ministry out of the church. Families withdrew from church attendance; some went into rebellion. These events created fears among the English that the King aimed at tyranny. Charles’s response was ruthless. Divine right monarchy was asserted by the Anglican clergy , disaffected officeholders were removed , and the Whig campaign was discredited as likely to lead to civil war. Charles twice sent James to rule in Scotland , cementing the loyalty of the Scottish elite to his family. Ireland became quiescent, but here Mr. Harris is less authoritative . Revolution is also divided in two with a first part on James’s reign and a second on the Revolution, 1688–1691. Some recent historians see James as a successful monarch intent on improving the lot of his coreligionists who was 87 overthrown only by an invading Dutch army and the collaboration of some of the English elite. For Mr. Harris, James was undone by his failure to maintain the alliance with Tory Anglicans that Charles had forged. In overwhelmingly Catholic Ireland under Tyrconnnell, ninety percent of the army and twothirds of the corporations were made Catholic, and the Catholic clergy were pensioned and publicly celebrated the liturgy. In Scotland which was only two percent Catholic, James tried to get Parliament to grant Catholic toleration and, after failing, had to do so by royal indulgence and to include the dissident Presbyterians. He had hoped to establish a precedent for England, but instead split the Scots elite and made an alliance between former Episcopalian and Presbyterian enemies. In England, James kept an army in peacetime larger than had been seen before, failed to call Parliament , and broke the Anglican monopoly...

The Ulster Scots and the Engagement, 1647–8

This article examines the actions of the various groups that made up the Ulster Protestant interest from shortly after the end of the First Civil War in England in late 1646 to the defeat of the Engagement in 1648. At the beginning of this period the English parliament took a renewed interest in Ulster, sending men and commanders, which accelerated a process of polarising the hitherto united Ulster British forces along ethnic lines. This culminated in almost unanimous support for the Engagement by the Ulster Scottish élite, while their Ulster English counterparts generally remained loyal to the parliamentary commanders in the province. Within Ulster Scottish society a further division occurred, between the royalist-inclined élite and much of the populace, who followed their Presbyterian ministers in opposing the Engagement. The article attempts to explain why the Ulster Scottish elite made this choice, and seeks to place this series of events within a British/Irish context, exhibiting the interrelated nature of events in each of the three kingdoms from the unique perspective of Protestant Ulster.

The Impact of Europeanisation on Regional Governance: A Study of Catalonia and Scotland

This article examines the role of political elites in the Europeanisation of regional governance, arguing that domestic conceptions of governance shape the way in which elites view their participation in European Union (EU) decision-making. It compares and contrasts the experiences of Scotland and Catalonia, two ‘regions’ that have recently obtained greater political autonomy. The article begins by examining how European integration encouraged the decentralisation of power, providing contextual information on the devolution process and the current status of domestic constitutional arrangements in the United Kingdom and Spain. It then examines how political elites are seeking greater participatory rights within the EU, evaluating the effectiveness of domestic and European channels of influence. Despite lacking formalised points of access to the EU policy process, the article argues that Catalan and Scottish elites have been successful in placing issues on the EU agenda and sustaining the debate on regional participation in EU decision-making. While the gradual formation of institutionalised channels of co-operation could lead to greater influence in the EU policy process over the long term, it would be more appropriate in the short-term to focus on the agenda-setting powers of regional elites.

Scottish Elites. Edited by T. M. Devine. Pp. xxii, 194. Edinburgh: John Donald. 1994. £18.50.

<i>Scottish Elites</i>. Edited by T. M. Devine. Pp. xxii, 194. Edinburgh: John Donald. 1994. £18.50.

Review: Scottish Elites

Review: Scottish Elites

Making the Nervous System

The nervous system sprawls across the eighteenth-century landscape, its fibres innervating the science and society of the period. It was within the nervous system after all that Lockean epistemology met physiology: to have 'feeling' meant not only to have superior perceptions but also refined and delicate nerves. It was by deliberate analogy with sympathy in the nervous system that Adam Smith understood social sympathy to act: both concepts underwrote the solidarity of a lowland Scottish elite. Rather later, it was by locating the mental faculties of traditional philosophy within the brain substance that the phrenologists sought to naturalize the interests of a new outsider group. At the end of the century the whole metaphor of nervous organization, in the philosophies of Lamarck and Cuvier, distinguished man from beast and European from savage. Historians who work on all these subjects will, at some point, have to take seriously the research in these two books, whose original publication dates differ by eightythree years. In one way Renato Mazzolini's The Iris in Eighteenth-Century Physiology is a superbly detailed footnote to Max Neuburger's monumental The Historical Development of Experimental Brain and Spinal Cord Physiology before Flourens. Neuburger was an Austrian Jew, born in 1868. He qualified in medicine in Vienna. A typical mid-European polymath, he taught the history of medicine in his native city for modest reward until 1938. In 1939 he fled Vienna and arrived in London, with two suitcases and five shillings. He returned to Vienna in 1952 and died there three years later. Neuburger's prolific historical work was characterized by two features. He had a supremely detailed acquaintance with a vast number of primary sources and he attempted to display the relations of medicine and philosophy. Such a sympathy with the past, of course, was directed by Neuburger's desire to celebrate the heroic labours of the forerunners of modern experimental science. Progressivist, but never patronizing, Neuburger was extraordinarily sensitive to the intricate technical details of early experimentation. The present work first appeared in 1897, when Neuburger was twenty-eight years old. It has long been regarded as a classic text. Written without the benefit of a rich secondary literature, it surveys theories of nervous function and experiments on the nervous system throughout Europe from Thomas Willis up to, but not including, Flourens. This excellent translation by Edwin