Two things define Scotland’s current and future connections to the EU - We need to recognise we are external to the EU's thinking, and we need to rectify the generally poor knowledge of the EU among the general population and among our politicians.
A successful EU accession process and future membership would be predicated on Scotland and its political system understanding and internalising both how the EU worked and how Scotland fit into the wider puzzle. Pro-EU sentiment alone would not deliver a pre-accession relationship or achieve core objectives in the accession negotiations. Joining the EU would be a major constitutional decision; it would transform the future Scottish state. In that context, it is incumbent on proponents of independence and EU membership to offer detail on how they propose to address the issues involved. It is not adequate to suggest that, since the Scottish electorate voted against the UK leaving the EU in 2016, the electorate is inherently in favour of EU membership for a Scottish state at a future point. It is equally unsatisfactory to contend that, in the event of independence, the questions of Scottish EU membership would spontaneously resolve themselves. Neither argument is convincing.