Can an English person become Scottish? According to
Scottish nationalists any English person and indeed any other person becomes
Scottish as soon as they move to Scotland. Scottish nationalists make a lot of
this idea because it makes the SNP seem inclusive and diverse. For this reason,
they emphasise that there are English people who support Scottish independence.
There are French people too and Germans and people from all over the world who want
Scotland to separate from the rest of Britain. This makes the SNP loving and
welcoming and not at all like any other historical nationalist movement.
This loving welcoming SNP versus an ideology founded on hatred of our nearest neighbour is crucial for understanding the
motivations behind Scottish nationalism. If it could demonstrably be shown that
it was one or the other, it would justifiably affect perceptions of the SNP and
Scottish independence. The sort of thinking that is behind the SNP would also
affect what an independent Scotland would be like both for those who supported independence
and for those who didn’t and for those who could trace their ancestry back
to Robert the Bruce and for those who could not.
This person is now Scottish because he lives here. But
we immediately have a logical problem. What then makes him English? If
nationality is a function merely of where we live how can an English person
live in Scotland? If his previously Englishness was due to the fact that he
lived in England, he must lose it as soon as it moves to Scotland.
This is the whole problem of defining nationality in
terms of residence. It makes it something transient and indeed trivial. If
every Scot loses his Scottishness by moving abroad why is such an emphasis put
in Scotland on saltires and tartan and the other things that make up the
Scottish identity. Why is every packet of strawberries called Scottish if being
Scottish is merely a matter of where we live and something that we cast off
like a lizard skin when we move to England?
The question of whether an English person can become
Scottish cannot merely be a question of whether someone who has previously
lived in England (i.e. an English person) can move to Scotland (i.e. become a
Scottish person). This would make the question become trivial. Can someone move
from one country to another?
But if the question is not trivial, then the English
person must be obtaining his Englishness from something other than the fact
that he was merely living in England. What could this other thing be? What is
it that makes an English Scot maintain that he is both English and Scottish? It
cannot be residence, because he cannot unless he has a house straddling the
border live in both England and Scotland.
We have a choice then either there is no permanent
identity and it is simply a matter of where we live, which would make it
impossible for someone to be an English Scot, he would simply be a Scot, or
there is a more permanent way of establishing identity, that endures even when
we move abroad, but this cannot be based merely on residence.
If this is the case, then the English Scot is
describing two different things when he describes his Englishness and his
Scottishness. For instance, he is English because he was born there and his
parents came from there, but he is Scottish because he lives here.
But if that is the case then the reverse applies also.
The basis on which an English Scot is Scottish is different from the basis on
which a Scottish Scot is Scottish.
If nationality were merely a matter of where we live,
then there would be no Scottish National Party and there would be no desire for
Scottish independence. Imagine campaigning for years for Scotland to become
independent, only to move to England and cease to be Scottish.
Independence movements simply do not work that way.
They are based on the idea that there is something intrinsically different about
one people from the people from which they are separating. But that thing,
whatever it is, cannot merely be where they live. Why would that be grounds for
independence?
But trying to identify the grounds for the
distinguishing feature that means some Scots wish to separate from the rest of
Britain is much harder. It cannot merely be that we live in a part of Britain
called Scotland that was once independent. There were other independent kingdoms
in what is now Scotland before that, and we don’t wish to resurrect them. It
isn’t that we speak a different language from the other parts of Britain or are
in any important way culturally distinct. It isn’t that we lack political representation
or are politically oppressed. We elect MPs like everyone else in Britain and we
have our own devolved parliament too.
Why on earth then do we wish to separate from English
people who we allow would be Scottish as soon as they moved here. It must be
that we don’t think that they would be as Scottish as we are. No matter that
they would be English Scots, they would lack something that we have and this
something is the grounds for our desire to be independent from them.
This is the problem with the question can English people
become Scots. If the answer is yes, then Scottish nationalism becomes without
purpose and without reason. If our objection is merely that people who could
become Scottish simply by moving here vote for Tories and vote for Brexit and
don’t allow us a veto, then the same argument would apply equally to an independent
Scotland. People living in Aberdeenshire might be outnumbered in voting by
people living in Strathclyde. Aberdeenshire wishes might be vetoed.
The answer that is always given by Scottish nationalists
is that Aberdeenshire is not a country and for that reason would have to accept
the will of the majority. But what is it that makes Scotland a country, and what is this thing that distinguishes Scotland from Aberdeenshire, if
people from anywhere in the world can move here and become Scots? If what makes Scotland a country is merely people from anywhere residing here and thereby becoming Scots what distinguishes Scotland from anywhere else in Britain where those same people can move including Aberdeenshire. It cannot merely be the rocks and the mountains. Land alone does not
make a country.
The sense that Scots have of being a country of being
a nation with a grievance against the Tory, Brexit voting rest of Britain has
to be grounded in something other than mere residency. The very desire for independence
makes no sense at all if every British citizen living in the parts of Britain
which Scots want to be independent from could immediately be as Scottish as us
just by moving here. What then would we be trying to be independent from?
The inclusive welcoming Scottish nationalism is
therefore self-refuting. If it really were the foundation of the SNP, there would
be no SNP, because under those circumstances the desire for independence would be senseless.