Independence or Union: Scotland’s past and Scotland’s present
T. M. DEVINE

Remarkably few political issues in modern British history have generated thoroughly widespread popular passion and sustained public engagement.  The 2014 referendum on Scottish independence was one such episode: so, too, was the great crisis over Irish Home Rule, whose centenary coincided with the Scots debate. In both 1914 and 2014 there was mass political involvement, and in Ireland in 1914 (unlike in Scotland a century later) this turned to ­militancy. In 1914 and in 2014 figures from the world of the arts, literature and the academy who had hitherto avoided party positions were moved to make their allegiances public. Prominent scholars, including historians, normally reticent about taking up political stands, contributed to both the Irish and  Scottish national conversations. By far the most significant of these in 2014 was Tom Devine, who had received a knighthood in the birthday honours list earlier in the year for “services to the study of Scottish history”.

The turbulence and excitements of 2014, when Devine announced his support for independence for Scotland, have not displaced professional values cultivated over a long and distinguished academic career: his new work is no polemic, but is rooted in careful ­evidence-based enquiry and argument.