Have traditional forms of political participation increased in Scotland following the 2014 independence referendum?

Abstract

It has been said that the 2014 Independence Referendum has changed politics in Scotland forever. So far, however, it would seem that this assertion has been made largely on the basis of the great public engagement witnessed over the course of the referendum campaign, and little work has been done to ascertain whether this has carried over to the present day. Thus, this paper sought to fill an important gap in the existing literature by conducting a study to discover whether traditional forms of political participation - for example, electoral participation and identifying/becoming involved with political parties - have increased in Scotland following the Referendum. The decision to focus on traditional political participation is arguably more important than ever given its considerable decline in recent decades, while non-traditional forms - including public demonstrations and the signing of e-petitions - continue to grow in popularity. Using data gathered by The Electoral Commission and The Hansard Society, and using a series of graphical depictions and Independent Samples t-test analyses, this three-part longitudinal study sought to measure whether electoral turnout had increased, whether the Scottish people had become more attached to political parties, and finally whether more people were taking an active part in a political party's election campaign in the years following the Referendum. In all three cases, evidence was found to suggest that an increase had occurred, but not all increases were found to be statistically significant. Nevertheless, given the short time that has lapsed since the event, it the argument of this paper that the findings need not prove statistically significant to make a positive contribution to the field. Rather, they invite further studies to discover whether a causal relationship can be identified between the Referendum and the increase in participation, as well as whether we can expect the effect to be part of a long-term trend or merely prove a momentary blip.