Examining Scottish Nation-Building As Trajectory

Examining Scottish nation-building as trajectory: The role of welfare and shared values in the national discourses of Labour and the Scottish National Party 1967-2014 Paul Gillen University of Stirling Submission for PhD in Politics January 2017 I Acknowledgements A number of people have helped me to complete this project, in very different ways. I must begin by thanking my PhD supervisors, Dr. Peter Lynch and Dr. Kevin Adamson. Both have provided me with a great deal of inspiration and moral support, and I am extremely thankful for all of the work they have put into assisting me over the course of my thesis. Several other people have helped me throughout the writing process, including Dr. Christopher Minty, Dr. Fiona Duncan, who provided moral support; and Shirley-Anne and Roderick, who have understood my need to juggle work and my studies. Thank- you, also, to my examiners Colin Clark and Tim Peace for their kind words, advice and suggestions. Finally, I would like to thank my Mum and Dad, Charles and Rowena. They have supported me in a great number of ways, and without their help, I am sure that the writing process would have been much more difficult. Thanks to you all! II Abstract This study examines a trajectory of the national discourses of Labour and the Scottish National Party (SNP), with reference to significant events during the course of contemporary Scottish politics, including the failed devolution referendum and election of a Conservative Government which sought to ‘shrink’ the welfare state in 1979; the establishment of a Scottish Parliament in 1999; the election of an SNP minority administration and then a majority Government in 2007 and in 2011, respectively; and the Scottish independence referendum in 2014. In doing so, it traces the development of nation-building over a period of nearly 50 years in Scotland. A nation-building battle between Labour and the SNP is uncovered, and the nature of that battle is examined in detail. The argument presented is that Labour and the SNP based their nation-building strategies on arguments around welfare and social justice, and that they used their national discourses to construct narratives about which constitutional options best suited Scotland. The study portrays how, over time, the SNP outmanoeuvred Labour on the left of Scottish politics, and how their social democratic discourse supplemented their arguments for independence based on representation and the democratic right of nations to have independent statehood. Labour used its national discourse to challenge the nationalism of the SNP and the idea of independence; but also to reinforce the legitimacy of the UK state’s role in Scotland. It is portrayed how the national discourses of Labour and the SNP were, in several respects, characterised by discursive continuity, from the late 1960s until the 2014 independence referendum. This reinforces the idea that nationalism and nation- building are remarkably consistent. However, nationalism is opportunistic, and this study portrays how major political events in Scotland have presented new challenges and opportunities to two different – but in many ways similar – Scottish nation- building strategies. III Table of Contents 1.Introduction 1 2.Discourse analysis: A theoretical and methodological outline 19 3.The role of welfare and shared values in nation-building 41 4.The national discourse of Labour and the SNP from the late 1960s to 1997 67 5.New opportunities and challenges: devolution from 1997 to 2007 123 6.The nation-building discourse of Labour and the SNP 2007-2011: New opportunities for the SNP, and new challenges for Labour 166 7. The opportunities and challenges of the independence referendum: 2011- 2014 192 8.Examining the trajectory of national discourses: what has been learnt in the Scottish context? 224 Bibliography 244 IV Chapter one Introduction This study examines the nation-building strategies of Labour and the Scottish National Party (SNP) from 1967 until the Scottish independence referendum, which took place on 18 September 2014. It traces the development and maintenance of political discourse over time, in order to reveal the ideological nature of nation- building in Scotland. An important aspect of nation-building in Scotland is that two major political parties—Labour and the SNP—both claimed to be supportive of the welfare state and egalitarianism in Scotland, yet they offered alternative visions of state welfare, equality, fairness, solidarity and social justice within the UK (Labour), and in an independent Scotland (the SNP), respectively. These signifiers were articulated as ‘shared values’, and the meaning of such signifiers was contested, making them ‘essentially contested concepts’ (Gallie, 1956: 167–168). They were used by both parties to create a sense of nationhood—a social community. According to Frederik Barth (1969), the social processes of exclusion and incorporation maintain discrete categories, despite the alteration of participation and membership over the course of individual life histories, and cultural differences can persist despite inter-ethnic contact and interdependence. This means that boundaries can persist despite the flow of people across them, and that an absence of mobility, contact and information is not necessarily required to make categorical ethnic distinctions (1969: 10), thus indicating that nationalists must find other ways to socially construct identity. Therefore, in order to build and maintain support for their constitutional preferences, Labour and the SNP subtly constructed their own conceptions of the Scottish ‘nation’ not on ethnic lines, but by presenting slightly different versions of welfare. This helped to establish a nation-building competition in Scotland, which is the central investigation of this study. Indeed, according to Mooney and Scott (2016), arguments around welfare became important in Scotland’s constitutional debate, and filtered into the debate on Scottish independence. 1 To aid the study, the concept of ‘political frontiers’ is employed, enabling the researcher to investigate how Labour and the SNP discursively individuated identity and organised political space in order to establish and maintain competing identities, and to organise that system into support for their political causes. A trajectory of national discourse is examined in order to highlight how nation-building in Scotland changed over time, and what the implications of that were for Scottish politics. An introduction to nationalism and nation-building Nationalism and the ‘nation’ are integral to our understanding of nation-building. According to Anthony D. Smith, nationalism is ‘An ideological movement for attaining and maintaining autonomy, unity and identity for a population which some of its members deem to constitute an actual or potential “nation”’ (2001: 9). Therefore, nationalism is a way of thinking, or ideological consciousness, where nations, national identities, and national homelands appear as natural (Billig, 1995: 10). It can be considered a doctrine, whereby ‘the people’ within a nation believe that they are distinctive through shared culture, history, institutions, religion, or principles (Deutsch, 1954). Nationalism’s aim is therefore to ensure that ‘the people’ are in charge of their ‘collective destiny’, which includes protecting the identity and the dignity of the people as a nation, and the maintenance of national unity. This is thought to be best achieved through a government in the nation’s ‘own state’ (Harris, 2009: 4–5). Thus, the nation is an inherent focus of nationalism as an ideology. In his seminal work, Benedict Anderson defines the nation as an ‘imagined political community’ (1983). The nation aspires for self-rule under a political system that expresses and reinforces their distinct characteristics. Nations, which are often defined as sets of people or tribes, are socially constructed, making it quite unclear who is included in ‘the nation’ and who is excluded (Kersting, 2011: 1645). For Smith, the nation is ‘a named human community occupying a homeland, and having common myths and a shared history, a common public culture, a single economy and common rights and duties for all members’. The nation cannot be described as a state nor is it an ethnic community (Smith, 2001: 12–13). Nation-building, then, is an ideological construct (Brown, 2000). It is a process of constructing a social community within a nation-state. Contemporary nationalists— who can take the form of parties, movements and states—attempt to assert power in 2 a particular territory in order to form a ‘collective identity’. Existing institutions, customs and traditions are all important, as political actors attempt to redefine national characteristics. Nation-building is ‘based mostly on values and beliefs that enhance support for and the legitimacy of the (new) state’ (Kersting: 2011: 1645). Early work on nation-building focused on the process of ‘constructing identification with and uniting previously disparate communities, in newly independent states’. (Mitchell, 2014: 1). The process of decolonisation caused new states to emerge, but identification by the citizens in these news states was not present (ibid). Nation- building states, such as France, used institutions including education, the military, and administrative processes to create unitary state machinery, but to also establish a common sense of identity. However, the British state had a more pluralistic approach, allowing institutions such as the Church, the

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