News and opinion

Referendum reflections

Academics from The Future of the UK and Scotland programme offer some preliminary observations on the referendum and its aftermath.

Does the next Scottish Labour leader face mission impossible?

Craig McAngus discusses how Scottish Labour’s new leader has a formidable challenge of rebuilding the party’s image in Scotland.

English Votes on English Laws: the English constitutional preference?

Professor Charlie Jeffery and Professor Richard Wyn Jones reflect on the devolution debate that took place on the 14th October at the House of Commons, and the ‘English Question’.

The SNP are the likely winners from the Smith Commission process

The Smith Commission is accepting party proposals regarding what further devolution will look like for Scotland. Craig McAngus, Research Fellow at the Centre on Constitutional Change, argues that the SNP will come out of the process as the likely winners. They will be able to point to their proposals as being the will of the Scottish people, while attacking the other parties (mainly Labour) for selling Scotland constitutionally short.

Taking England Seriously: The New English Politics

What next for electoral politics in Scotland?

Malcolm Harvey looks forward to the UK General Election in May 2015 and the issue of electoral politics.

‘And the Winner is… the Referendum’: Scottish Independence and the Deliberative Participation of Citizens

Stephen Tierney discusses how the Scottish referendum has not changed the borders of the UK but it has challenged the boundaries of our imagination.