The delicate health of our former prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, has given a fresh impetuous to the examination of her time in office and the legacy it has left for Scotland. It was certainly the focus for Professor Tom Devine as he gave his thoughts on the fall and rise of the Scottish nation over the past quarter of a century or so. Introduced by Fiona Hyslop, the current Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, Professor Devine gave a fluent and well constructed argument at the event organised by the Educational Institute for Scotland, the main teaching union north of the border.

Professor Devine described Scotland’s transformation from a nation reeling from pessimism and strife at the end of the 1970s to one undergoing a contemporary renaissance, a nation that had re-found its confidence. Psyche and outlook were important features within the lecture, but alongside commentary on the changes in the lives of Scotland’s citizens. It was an uplifting lecture for the majority gathered.

Kicking off with the grim ending of the 1970s following despair at the World Cup in Argentina and the rejection of devolution in the ballot, Professor Devine characterised the period through a popular cartoon of the time showing the lion rampant, caged but with the door open, cowering in a corner too fear’t to come out. The resultant vote of no confidence in the government led to the event Professor Devine argues is the key to understanding today: the Conservative election victory of 1979. From here the British government was to follow a set of policies that struck at the very sense of the nation, as deep as any since Union, Professor Devine argued, with the Conservative government ruling over a period of ‘revolutionary destabilisation’.

It is in the time since the Conservative defeat of 1997 and the subsequent successful devolution vote that the Scottish recovery can be traced. Alongside an encouraging political environment ,Professor Devine mapped out several positives including the establishment of a post-industrial economy, the historic change from emigration to immigration in Scotland’s population and the upward mobility in the labour force that swelled the ranks of the middle class. Here Professor Devine noted the success of the comprehensive schooling system in providing a society based on credentials and not patronage.

It was within such positives and successes that Professor Devine poured scorn on one new establishment within Scotland, the Centre for Confidence and Well-Being. Launched at the end of 2004, the centre’s aims include seeking, ‘to enhance problem solving and increase confidence, optimism, life-satisfaction and happiness’. For Professor Devine, the nation is beyond the need for such emotional support, having successfully come out from under the coat-tails of its contemporary mother, Margaret Thatcher.

Perhaps it is the longer view of the historian and the more obvious social upheaval of the 1980s that led Professor Devine to view the Thatcher period as key to the Scotland we see around us. The challenge of Thatcher to the social concord of the Scottish elites was different from that posed by previous governments, but the political and national confidence that Professor Devine argues grew in the aftermath of that period is perhaps more difficult to see. The devolution success of 1997 was accomplished without a groundswell of popular support, just under 45%  of the electorate had voted in favour, and the most recent Scottish Parliament elections of 2007 had a far from inspiring turnout of around 52% . Indeed the call for the devolution vote could be placed within a lack of direction and confidence within the British context rather than a successful Scottish drive, while there exists today a broad lack of interest in the activities of the Scottish Parliament.

Professor Devine noted that he was no sociologist, and that may be why his contempt for the Centre for Confidence and Well-Being missed the fact that agencies offering therapeutic solutions to social problems have a well-established and prominent role within Scottish society. From primary school pupils to Old Firm fans, understanding your emotions and those of others is de rigueur. Indeed the role of therapeutic education within Scottish schools could undermine the meritocracy Professor Devine supported, given the therapeutic use of intangible feelings rather than academic results.

Raising such a point in the questioning at the end of the lecture, I asked Professor Devine if we could say that Princess Diana could be the mother of the nation. Professor Devine gave the idea short shrift and noted that the impact on Scotland of her death was less so than in England, believing us Scots were more skeptical of the aura built up around the princess. He did though acknowledge a connection between the outpourings after her death and such groups as the Centre for Confidence and Well-Being, jokingly suggesting it could be renamed as the Princess Diana Centre.