Tag Archives: New Scotland

Positivity

Posted on
19

By Mike Small

Pundits seem to be coalescing around the idea that a ‘positive message’ is an essential part of political campaigning (nothing new here, see Pat’s Juggernaut of Joy thesis). Whether it’s Obama’s upbeat derivative (but ultimately empty) Yes We Can, or, as critics had it, Salmond’s indy question (characterised by some as some sort of Derren Brown-style mass hypnosis), the idea of positivity is the key, or so we’re told. It’s simple: people who whinge and moan all day become a bit of a drain to be around. We naturally gravitate towards those who bring a bit of sunshine and light into our life.

This presents the Unionists with a challenge. How to oppose the Yes Campaign with a positive? What is the positive case for the Union? Well it’s about security, continuity and stability. All good things, but in stressing these you have to also sort of pretend it’s all okay as is, and that’s where they get unstuck. The nationalists have to say things will be okay, the unionists have to pretend things are okay. It’s not jam tomorrow but it’s a set of ideas – a vision – based on hope. Now we know that this might not work out but we have aspiration whereas in the HERE and NOW we kind of know perfectly well what things aren’t working. UK Plc has nationalised the banks and given our money away to the super rich. People can’t get the homes they need, and there’s an outbreak of mass unemployment, fuel poverty and a generalised economic insecurity that strikes into the heart of peoples well-being by the residual stress it creates. Continue reading →

Why have the Greens Disappeared from the Independence Debate?

Posted on
9
By Justin Kenrick
Great post Clare – many thanks. It points to the liberating possibilities that accompany recognising what holds you down, and the creativity and responsibility that comes with recovering hope and refusing to blame others any more. This post is absolutely great.
But it is also far harder than that for (at least) three reasons:
(1)  there’s a need to recognise the forces out there (and habits in here) that disempower, unless you do that you can’t be free of them, but paradoxically you also can’t be free of them until you stop blaming the forces out there, and instead insist on taking the blame for going along with it, and so reclaim the power to change it

The Upside of Austerity

Posted on
4

By Fiona MacInnes

My Utopian dream for the New Scotland is to be liberated from the tyranny of stuff. If you have ever had to crawl around the floor and contort yourself to reach into the gunk-filled areas of your home and investigate murky folding sofa beds to retrieve the item known as the ‘Polly pocket’, then you will begin to know what I mean.

I sit amid a claustrophobic accumulation of stuff and wonder how this nylon and fake velvet coup happened. I can just remember the far off days when each room of the house, bought with the innocence of those days as a 20 year home not a financial investment, echoed with uncarpeted emptiness.

I am to blame for the second hand kitch that began the clutter, but that came from an obsession with getting bargains and rescuing ‘must have’ flying duck sets from such emporia as the cancer shop in Stockbridge. I confess to losing the plot when I insisted in shipping, like so much emotional baggage, a deadweight of an enormous second hand piano from the Area 7 warehouse at Abbey Hill all the way to Orkney.

In the last recession, funded by our giros courtesy of Thatcher’s North sea oil bonanza, us expendable youth combed the Edinburgh streets on bin night for furniture for our shared housing association flat. Lauriston Place was entirely decked out with other folk’s cast offs, rugs, sofas, mattresses, chairs, tables, fridges and even a piano from the Castle Trades Hotel in the  Grassmarket. Spores of consumptive TB and bedbug infestation are modern ills that never entered our heads then. Continue reading →

Altered State

Posted on
22

By Mike Small

“We have given ourselves the permission to be ambitious.” More than anything among a barrage of new sensations (collective relief, delight, and unbridled optimism) it was the sense of the possible…the hopeful that followed Thursdays election that were unfamilar and very un-Scottish feelings. We are supposed to be ‘canny’, cautious, always looking for the negative. This result seems wild reckless and ridiculously bold. It’s wonderful for that.

This is an altered state, as was witnessed by a phone-call increase in powers on Friday night and David Cameron and Michael Moore’s immediate concessions to Salmond.

For those arguing that the result was either a muddled mistake or masks a deep antipathy to real constitutional change, I’d remind them that only in December 2010 TNS polling had the following numbers: Union 45%, Independence 40%, Undecided 12%. How to win a referendum – and what the process is (legal and political)  – will be next up in a different article, for now let’s look at an ambitious programme might look like?

Working on the assumption that the best way to empower people and feed this growing self-confidence is to see BIG THINGS working well and change that’s good, we are asking: What’s the big idea?

We know that there’s big economic hits coming, so sloshing cash around isn’t possible, this is why the corporation tax, oil revenue and Crown Estate issues are so important. Until we know how these can be resolved we won’t know how the economics will look, but let’s look at what some key ‘ambitious’ policy hits might be. All of these have a common link of being about creating a ‘way in’. This is about departure not arrival. Continue reading →