The End of the SNP’s Imperial Era, What Comes Next and the Politics of Liberation

The SNP’s leadership contest has not so far been the greatest advert for the party. Shaped by the end of the Salmond-Sturgeon era of the SNP and Scottish politics which has lasted for nearly two decades, behind the once impressive, professional and disciplined façade a deep malaise and decay has been revealed.

In recent days the controversies have broken at an ever-increasing rate: the confusion over how many members could vote and cards had been issued; the belated release of SNP membership figures; the resignation of SNP media chief Murray Foote; and following that resignation of Peter Murrell, the partner of Nicola Sturgeon, as SNP Chief Executive. And that is all in the course of less than a week.

At the onset of the leadership contest there was an assumption that with a bit of a tweak here and there, the show could keep on the road and continued progress assured. Now such perceptions look deeply complacent and out of touch, ignorant or deliberately not knowing of the true extent of the state of affairs at party headquarters – all throwing up big questions for the future.

The legacy of eight years of Sturgeon leadership

This malaise and decline did not come from nowhere. The backdrop to this contest is germane to what we are seeing before our eyes. The eight years of Sturgeon leadership, the way the party was managed, the deliberate lack of democracy and debate – all fed into the direction and decisions of how the SNP and government was run as a kind of closed shop from the top-down.

This is not to deny the obvious qualities Sturgeon had and has: a gifted political communicator and someone who presided over a period of sustained SNP electoral success; but beyond that there was no real strategy either for government or independence. 

Since Sturgeon announced her resignation on 15 February, a dam holding back powerful elemental forces has finally burst. Its walls have crumbled and a wave of confusion, chaos and disorientation has thrown people about, leaving many of them completely bewildered; some are even so confused they are in denial there is a crisis.

The events of the past month and even more the past week have to be seen in a bigger context. The party membership exploded post-2014 and peaked at 125,691 in 2019 (up from 25,642 just after the indyref). But we knew even then at the party’s peak that this expanded membership was hugely inactive: one measurement being the turnout in depute leadership contests: 33% in 2016 and 26% in 2018. 

Party membership was always going to come down from that peak and SNP HQ built up problems for themselves by not publishing figures since the December 2021 one of 103,884. It was clear since then that membership was declining further, aided by recent controversies such as the GRR Bill, but the fall to 72,186 is a steep one, albeit one that leaves the party by far the biggest in Scotland and larger than all the other parties added together.

The current confusion and chaos in the SNP isn’t just about membership. It is about attitude and the over-bearing self-confidence and hubris that comes with long periods of political supremacy. The SNP we should remember were once outsiders; the anti-establishment party. This was true as recently as 2007.

Now the SNP are a party of the insider class – an embodiment of the devolution class political establishment. This has come at a certain cost: the party has lost its radical edge, its political antenna, and understanding of what holding office should be about and the its ultimate aims. In sixteen years in office the absence of a sustained challenge from political opponents has bred an arrogance and complacency that the party can do what it likes in office and remain there in perpetuity. Such a mindset when it takes hold in any party spells trouble: the case of Scottish Labour and its steep decline offering an obvious example.

The SNP Leadership Contest

Against this backdrop the three candidates have not surprisingly struggled to find traction. Kate Forbes and Ash Regan have projected themselves as the ‘change’ candidates, portraying Humza Yousaf as the party establishment and ‘continuity’ candidate. Forbes and Regan have kicked back against the practices of the party leadership and questioned how the race is run. 

All three are now trying to distance themselves from the wreckage of the party as the entire edifice seems to be falling apart and imploding. It is a messy sight in which a once omnipotent and efficient machine begins to show its wear, tear and limitations and seriously malfunction. 

While the three struggle to develop coherent strategies for renewing government and independence, Kate Forbes has become identified with a social conservative set of positions informed by her faith and Free Church of Scotland membership. At the campaign’s outset she laid out her opposition to same sex marriage and a woman’s right to choose, saying these were personal matters for her that she would not legislate on. 

Such issues still trip her up on occasions. In a Sky News TV debate on Monday past the presenter Beth Rigby asked Forbes on six occasions about her views on gay conversion therapy. Forbes spoke of her ‘abhorrence’ at the practice, but was equivocal in supporting an outright ban. In a subsequent interview with Sophy Ridge on the same channel the following Sunday Forbes could not bring herself to condemn a ‘non-coercive approach’ on gay conversion therapy.

A number of mainstream independence supporters chose after the first interview to lay weight on Forbes’ use of the word ‘abhorrence’ and asserted that because of this she was against all gay conversion therapy. More than likely Forbes had been trying to leave herself with wriggle room when any future legislation comes forth including the possibility of an exemption on gay conversion therapy for religious bodies, but this should be discussed, not denied.

Words matter. We cannot live in a world of Orwellian doublespeak where we collude in the opposite of what is said. Similarly, the deceptions and disinformation presented by SNP headquarters and senior figures have long-term damaging consequences which will fester and damage the party’s prospects and sense of trust and legitimacy with members, supporters and voters. 

Who wins the SNP leadership contest matters. That person will not only lead the SNP but become First Minister of Scotland (unless there is some SNP Holyrood revolt against Kate Forbes if she wins). Yet increasingly it is likely Humza Yousaf or Kate Forbes will be elected on a thin prospectus with little idea of the future direction of the party, government and independence – and inherit a bewildered and divided party. 

The dangers of a politics of absolutes and illusions – and a moment of liberation

This is what it feels like as the era of imperial SNP dominance concludes. For just under twenty years the SNP have been defined by omnipotent leaders who have presided over an iron-discipline party which has defined Scottish politics and vanquished political opponents.

This has come at a cost which is increasingly evident all around. The disastrous state of the SNP as a party, the ineptitude and questionable decisions of senior figures, and the dubious actions of party HQ did not suddenly emerge in the past month. Rather, concerns and discontent have been building for years, with people who asked difficult questions ostracised and dismissed as ‘the awkward squad’.

There are a bigger set of takeaways from this. For one the politics of dealing in absolutes creates problems in a world filled with ambiguity and complexity. The belief and projection of the all-knowing leader which occurred under Salmond and even more Sturgeon in the long run did the party no favours. Similarly, the search for absolutes in this contest is effectively a mirage given the fractured nature of the party and the legacy the winning candidate will inherit. Yet, despite this in places there is still a yearning for perfection, and a leader and politics who will transcend difference and put the edifice back together.

All of this and more can be witnessed in how Yousaf, Forbes and Regan are portrayed. None are perfect or the finished article, but all have qualities. All have obvious shortcomings.

The bigger picture in this is important. The three candidates were released into the light of intense scrutiny with little warning or chance of preparation by Sturgeon’s sudden resignation. And subsequently the unhappy, unedifying state of the party has become increasingly apparent, forcing all three -and the debate – to deal with this messy legacy.

Expecting perfection and infallibility only leads to problematic politics, Added to this is a further strand – Nicola Sturgeon’s resignation has shown the limits of telling your supporters what they want to hear, which in turn leads to lots of them hearing what they want to hear – which not surprisingly never ends well.

Sturgeon embraced an approach on independence of consistently refusing to address hard choices and strategic options inherent in such an ambitious project. In this at its centre was a politics of illusion – part deliberate, part unconscious and reinforced every day as the least hard option of not confronting the myths, folklores and fairy tales which party members hold on independence and their party (and which all parties have in their core beliefs).

A politics of illusion is not leadership and not sustainable. Combined with the projection of absolutes and a desire for perfection, it makes a heady brew which was always going to implode. It does not feel like this at the moment, but the end of that era of illusion and with it the belief in easy answers is a massive release – even a kind of liberation.

In places that illusion continues. Numerous SNP voices believe that once the new leader is elected the show just continues: the SNP’s previous and current dominance, the self-discipline of previous years, and shared sense of mission towards independence. That understates the present state of malaise, how long there has been decay and things going wrong in the party, and that people need to wake up and realise what has gone wrong. Crises can be opportunities for change but only if you recognise they are crises.

Another political era is passing. The SNP won office in 2007 at the fag end of New Labour with the gloss having gone off Tony Blair due to the Iraq War. The Tories then became the UK Government in 2010, at first with the Lib Dems, a year before the SNP 2011 landslide. Thirteen of the sixteen years of SNP Government have had the Tories in UK office: providing a convenient enemy for the Nationalists.

That political age looks like it may be ending with the possible election of a Labour Government in 2024. If this does happen it will deprive the SNP of a potent Tory bogeyman and require a different SNP approach. At the moment there is little sign of this with the standard SNP line being that Labour are the same as the Tories: SNP Westminster leader Stephen Flynn saying on BBC Question Time last week of Keir Starmer that he is ‘David Cameron with a red tie.’ The SNP are going to have to come up with better lines.

It is disorientating, messy, and a complete stramash. But this is the direct result of the previous era of control and of the party hierarchy refusing to treat members as adults who can deal with complexity and make difficult choices. The next few years, whoever is elected will be more challenging and difficult for the SNP, but from recognising the scale of crisis and challenge the party is in, can come renewal, growth and the next generation of independence.

But that only happens if people can have the courage to break with the fairy tales and deceptions of recent times and embrace light, openness, honesty and complexity. That is a tall order after what has come before, but the SNP and independence have no option but to break with the past (for all its successes), or they will be defined by the excesses and mistakes of that past.