Scotland

Scotland Alba
Flag Coat of arms
Capital	Edinburgh
Largest city	Glasgow
Leaders
• Monarch	Charles III
• First Minister	Humza Yousaf
Legislature	Scottish Parliament
Area
• Total	80,231 km²
Population
• 2022 estimate	5,436,600

Scotland is a constituent country of the United Kingdom occupying the northern part of the island of Britain. Scotland is semi-autonomous, and has its own parliament but the British Parliament has supremacy over the Scottish. There are high levels of support for independence in Scotland but the British Government refuses to allow an independence referendum after the referendum in 2014 failed.

History

Union of the Crowns

Following the death of English Queen Elizabeth I in 1603, the English throne passed to King James VI of Scotland making him King James I of England. Although Scotland would remain officially independent for another 100 years they were effectively united with the English under the Stuart monarchy with the Scottish Kings preferring to reside in England over Scotland.

In 1707 the Act of Union officially united the Kingdoms of Scotland, and England forming the Kingdom of Great Britain.

Jacobite Rebellions

In 1688 King James II of England, (James VII of Scotland) was ousted by a bourgeois revolution and replaced by Dutch King William III of Orange. The deposed king fled to France, and over the next few years there were several unsuccessful skirmishes between the English, and the supporters of James II (Jacobites).

In 1701 James II died, and French King Louis XIV recognised his son James III as King James VIII of Scotland. In September 1715 a Jacobite uprising began leading to a few failed battles with English troops, before James III fled back to France in February 1916, and Jacobite troops disbanded.

In July 1745 Prince Charles Stuart, son of James III, landed in Scotland to began the last Jacobite rebellion, claiming the throne for his father. Jacobite forces reached as far south as Derby before being forced to retreat to wait for French reinforcements that never materialised. The rebellion ended with the battle of Culloden, a catastrophic defeat for the Jacobites, following which Charles fled back to France in June 1746. The house of Stuart would remain in exile in France until the death of Henry Stuart in 1807 ending the male Stuart line.

Following the failed Jacobite rebellion, the British Whig government under Henry Pelham set about destroying the Highlander culture and way of life, using methods such as outlawing tartan and replacing Gaelic with English as the language of government. Over the next century Highland clearances forcibly removed the native population from their land in a campaign of ethnic cleansing with the former occupants often emigrating to the Americas. Clearances continued into the 19th Century with potato famines exasperating the rate of highlanders forced to emigrate due to their land being stolen.

21st Century

In 2014 an independence referendum on Scottish Independence was held resulting in a rejection by 55.3% of the population. However, in the following years the desire for independence has only grown, especially since the 2016 Brexit referendum in which 62% of Scots voted to remain in the EU against the wishes of the UK.

Politics

The Scottish Parliament and Government were established in 1999, and have control over matters of health, education, justice, police, fire services, and housing in Scotland. There are 129 Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) elected by a bourgeois democratic system of proportional representation known as the Additional Member System. The political party with the most MSPs forms the government with one MSP being elected First Minister, the head of the Scottish Government.