"For many of us in Scotland our exploration of self-government, wider self-determination and statehood, ... is about developing more fully and appropriately a politics and nation fit for the modern age than the decaying, decrepit embers of the "Ukanian" state."
"Scottish statehood has an interest and responsibility for the politics and values of whatever form the rest of the UK takes. It would seem a small gain if Scotland went off trying to evolve into a northern social democracy, while England or the rest of the UK was reduced to some Rupert Murdoch ‘Fantasy Island Britain’ of marketisation, deregulation and representing the global classes of new wealth and power.
One of the aspirations of Scottish self-government and statehood is to dissolve the ancien regime and its modern expression, the neo-liberal state, and the bowdlerised, bastardised politics and economic vision which comes from it. This requires that radical democrats, nationalists and post-nationalists across these isles, realise the stakes we are playing for. This is a once in a generation opening for reform not just in Scotland, but across the UK, and a chance to be the gravediggers of that conservative order which has proved so unconducive to centre-left and progressive politics."