Scottish politics

Scottish Labour: The Never-ending Soap Opera That Matters Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, October 29th 2014 Scottish Labour loves talking about itself.  The evidence for this is everywhere in the last few days, in print media, TV and radio studios, and social media. Organisations which have lost their way, which are in decline and crisis, often do this as a displacement activity. Think of the Tories ‘banging on’ about Europe, or the BBC post-Savile. Such behaviour is never a good sign. It makes people think their internal obsessions are important, and that the minutiae of such debates matter to the

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Is Social Justice Really What Defines Modern Scotland? Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, October 8th 2014 There are many Scotlands and there are many realities, lives and experiences which do not find favour or voice in prevailing public descriptions. Many of our dominant versions give centrestage to politics, which isn’t all there is to life anywhere. Think of Yes and No, unionism and nationalism, left and right, Labour and SNP, Tory and anti-Tory. These are all politically restrictive labels in which some see themselves, and that define others who are different to them. How much of Scotland do these terms capture

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After the Spirit of 2014 Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, October 1st 2014 It is now coming up for two weeks tomorrow since Scotland’s independence referendum. The world moves on. The UK media’s attention has switched back to its usual tropes: Westminster parlour games and internal Tory and Labour machinations. The UK Parliament was recalled, not as some expected it would be, to deal with the backwater of a Scottish Yes vote to independence, but the predictable act of the UK providing cover for US lead action, yet again, in Iraq. There was dignity and solemnity in the Commons debate, showing

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We are One Scotland: Anatomy of a Referendum Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, September 24th 2014 It was a momentous moment in Scottish and British history. The Scottish independence referendum. It dominated Scottish and British airwaves in the last couple of weeks, and became a huge international story. Nearly every single cliché has been dug up, used and then over-used to exhaustion. What then as the excitement, claim and counter-claim quieten down, is there left to say and do? Actually, there is quite a lot. Let’s talk about the immediate reactions post-vote from the Scottish and British political classes. They both

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Why Scotland has finally woken up and become a democracy Gerry Hassan September 21st 2014 It has been an incredible few years to live in Scotland. Assumption after assumption about public life, society and the closed order of how politics has been traditionally done, has been turned upside down. People will still feel raw on either side. Yes people feel deflated and disappointed; No supporters sense that they were forced into a debate they didn’t want to have. But if we step back the bigger picture is an impressive and powerful one. It is one many of the observers from

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Britain is on Borrowed Time: The Future of Scottish Independence Gerry Hassan Open Democracy, September 19th 2014 Scotland voted No to independence. In answer to the question, ‘Should Scotland be an independent country?’, 1,617,989 voted Yes (44.7%) and 2,001,926 voted No (55.3%) in a massively impressive turnout of 84.6%: the highest ever anywhere in the UK in post-war times. The result, and campaign, will be rightly mulled over and analysed for years, but in the fast moving aftermath it is important to lay down some thoughts and calm-headed thinking. Scotland has changed and shifted in how it sees itself

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A Hopeful Guide to Scotland Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, September 17th 2014 This week, depending on the building US-UK government clamour for more military action in Iraq, Scotland will be the biggest story on the planet. News crews and journalists from all over the world are covering this. Glasgow and Edinburgh hotels are enjoying an unexpected bonanza with high occupancy rates. For at least one week, James Robertson’s famous dictum about ‘The News Where You Are’ will be met by the shock that for a short while, ‘The News Where We Are’ will be the same! It has,

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Is Scottish Labour Having a Good Independence Referendum? Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, September 9th 2014 Scotland is on the move. The polls have shown a significant shift towards Yes. One poll so far has produced a Yes lead, a watershed moment not just in the campaign, but also in the history of Scotland and the UK. Change is all around us. There is the enthusiasm of Yes; the incompetence and fear of No; the distrust in Westminster, Cameron and Miliband (the latter two earning each 23% trust ratings in Scotland), and the quiet sentiment that the Scottish Parliament is best

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Beyond the Cultural Cringe: The Need for a Multi-Story Scotland Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, September 3rd 2014 The independence referendum is remaking Scotland. History is being made which scholars will look back and study years from now. The very idea of Scotland is on the move and changing, as is what we think of as politics and even the notion of what is public. One of the constant refrains, both in the independence debate, and over the last 30 years, has been the importance, role and, critically, the fragility of Scottish culture. Whether it has been the existence (or not)

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Scotland: On the Eve of a Historic Choice Gerry Hassan, Caledonian Dreaming: The Quest for a Different Scotland, Luath Press £11.99 Reviewed by Joe Lafferty On the eve of a historic referendum on Scottish independence in September 2014, Gerry Hassan’s Caledonian Dreaming is a landmark book. He articulates, with incisive political and historical analysis, the landscape of what has taken the UK and Scotland to where they are today. And at the same time, this is a profoundly human book. Hassan is no stranger to serious and heavyweight political analysis with a number of books under his belt from The

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