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Brings to light the vital role coal miners played in the social and political history of 20th century ScotlandThroughout the 20th century Scottish miners resisted deindustrialisation through collective action and by leading the campaign for Home Rule. This book shows that coal miners occupy a central position in Scotland's economic, social and political history. It highlights the role of miners in formulating labour movement demands for political-constitutional reforms that helped create the conditions for the establishment of the Scottish Parliament in 1999. The author also uses the experiences of the miners to explore working class wellbeing more broadly throughout the prolonged and politicised period of deindustrialisation that culminated in the Thatcherite assault of the 1980s.Key FeaturesAnalyses the longer history of Scottish coal miners in terms of changing industrial ownership, production techniques and workplace safetyExamines deindustrialisation as a long-running, phased and politicised processUses generational analysis to explain economic and political changeRelates Scottish Home Rule to debates about economic security and working class welfareRelates this economic and industrial history to changes in mining communities and gender relations

The miners' strike of 1984–5 is a site of contested memories. A debate in the Scottish Parliament on the 30th anniversary in March 2014 highlighted three particular points of contention: the economics of coal and the social costs of closures; the strategies of the National Union of Mineworkers and the UK Conservative government; and the question of restorative justice for victimised strikers. This paper examines these controversies, measuring the perspectives of MSPs against the weight of historical evidence. It explores the moral economy of the Scottish coalfields, where closures in the 1960s and 1970s were agreed by the workforce because meaningful employment alternatives existed. Closures in the 1980s violated this moral economy. The paper demonstrates that the financial costs of producing coal were exaggerated in 1984, while the predicted negative social consequences of not producing coal were accurate. It argues that criticisms of NUM strategy in 1984–5 are outweighed by evidence that the Conservative government was attacking the moral economy, seeking to eliminate union voice from decisions about closures. It comments on the victimisation of strikers in 1984–5, arguing that contemporary calls for restorative justice are resisted by the Scottish government partly because the SNP – reflecting the broader mood in the Scottish Parliament – ignores the political salience of social class.

AbstractThe long-running deindustrialization in the Scottish coalfields, the consequence of political decisions, took place in three distinct periods analyzed here: "restructuring," 1958–1967, when, in response to union activism, a large number of closures was offset by government and industry initiatives to provide or stimulate alternative employment; "stabilization," 1968–1977, when closures were minimized as the broader industrial economy slowed; and then "accelerated contraction," 1978–1987, within the larger program of economic restructuring engineered by Margaret Thatcher's Conservative UK governments. Moral economy arguments shaped the debate about deindustrialization in the first two phases: closures were legitimate only where agreed to by the workforce, who would in turn receive guaranteed economic security. These factors did not apply in the final phase, when closures were enforced and redundant miners had limited employment alternatives.

This article contributes to debates about the economic framework of industrial politics by examining aspects of the 1984–5 miners' strike in Britain, focusing on developments in Scotland. It focuses on strike endurance and pit‐level variations in strike endurance by examining the contrasting quantity and quality of the material and moral resources available to the strikers at different collieries and in different communities. Powerful local variables in building or inhibiting strike commitment included pre‐strike pit‐level production, industrial relations, and the impact of debates about the economics and finances of coal‐getting; incomes gained for households during the strike by married women in part‐time and full‐time employment; expenditure saved by households in local authority housing where rents were in effect deferred by sympathetic local authorities; communal attitudes to pits, jobs, and redundancies; the character and weight of political tradition; and the cultural as well as economic role of women. By focusing on developments at community and colliery level the article challenges dominant narratives of the strike, which remain wedded to high politics, the strategy of the union leadership, changes in energy supply and policy, and public order.