How the SNP damaged the independence cause

If you really want to annoy a Scottish nationalist, tell them the 2014 Scottish independence referendum had a lot in common with Brexit. Well, what was the battle cry in both cases? It was ‘take back control’.

For all its internationalist rhetoric, the Yes campaign was – is – a campaign to erect borders against a union, the United Kingdom, that its advocates say does not serve the nation’s interests. Strip down the Leave campaign and it too was about erecting borders – albeit against a different union, the EU, which was claimed not to serve the nation’s interests. Indeed, historians may come to regard 2014 as the first manifestation of the national populism that has rocked Europe over the past decade. The 2016 Brexit referendum was just the next shoe to drop.