The Scottish Parliament opened in 1999. Since this devolution of powers, there has been an increase in the demand for empirically-based, policy relevant, comparative research to help design policies and determine their impact.

Designed to cover the most up-to-date Standard Grade requirements, these books should provide everything you need to prepare your students for their exams. There are exam-style questions and full-colour presentation throughout.

Scotland has changed, politically and culturally, in recent years, with persistent demands for independence culminating in a referendum in 2014. On this fluid political landscape, social welfare can be co-opted towards a wider ‘nation-building’ project. As a result, social work in Scotland is increasingly divergent from the rest of the UK. This book offers a comprehensive, critical and timely account of the profession in these changing times, charting its historical development, current practice and future directions. Bringing together a range of academic and practice experts, it considers social work as it is currently but also as it might be. Divided into three parts, the first part sets a context, identifying historical, philosophical, policy and legal influences on current practice. The second part picks up on current themes in policy and practice, addressing key issues of professional identity in an increasingly integrated policy context. The final part contains chapters on current domains of practice, identifying key areas of legislation, policy and practice. Social Work in a Changing Scotland is essential reading for social work students, offering an accessible yet critical overview of the profession. It will also inform current practitioners to understand better the changing contexts within which they practise, while prompting further academic debate about Scottish social work.

This is a full-scale study of prices in medieval Scotland, c. 1260-1542, which includes detailed discussions of coinage, and weights and measures. Nearly 6000 prices are listed individually, average prices are calculated for each commodity, and for groups of commodities such as cereals and livestock. Scots prices are compared with English, and the significance of the data for the economic history of medieval Scotland is analyzed fully. This is the only full study to have been undertaken on Scots medieval prices, and there is no comparable work on Scottish medieval economic history in print.

The inside story of the campaign that rocked the United Kingdom to its foundations, and the implications of the Scottish independence movement for the future of British politics.

In recent years, the reduction of alcohol-related harm has emerged as a major policy issue across Europe. Public health advocates, supported by the World Health Organisation, have challenged an approach that targets problem-drinking individuals, calling instead for governments to control consumption across whole populations through a combination of pricing strategies, restrictions on retail availability and marketing regulations. Alcohol, Power and Public Health explores the emergence of the public health perspective on alcohol policy in Europe, the strategies alcohol control policy advocates have adopted, and the challenges they have faced in the political context of both individual states and the European Union. The book provides a historical perspective on the development of alcohol policy in Europe using four case studies – Denmark, England, Scotland and Ireland. It explores the relationship between evidence, values and power in a key area of political decision-making and considers what conditions create – or prevent – policy change. The case studies raise questions as to who sets policy agendas, how social problems are framed and defined, and how governments can balance public health promotion against both commercial interests and established cultural practices. This book will be of interest to academics and researchers in policy studies, public health, social science, and European Union studies.

In Quebec and Scotland, questions of constitutional change, national identity, and national grievance play an important role in the electoral calculations of political parties and voters. Taking a strong stance on the national question can have strategic benefits both for parties pushing for greater autonomy and for those endorsing the status quo. In this in-depth look at issue voting, authors Éric Bélanger, Richard Nadeau, Ailsa Henderson, and Eve Hepburn examine how the national question affects political parties and voter behaviour in both substate nations. Through party manifestos, interviews with legislators, and opinion survey data, this book demonstrates that calls for constitutional change influence political debate, competition, voter choice, and the outcome of elections not only within Quebec and Scotland but also across Canada and the United Kingdom. Minority nationalist parties, the authors show, can gain support by claiming ownership of issues with widespread public agreement, such as self-determination and protecting the identity and interests of the nation. A comprehensive analysis of recent electoral politics, The National Question and Electoral Politics in Quebec and Scotland greatly enhances our understanding of the electoral impact of substate nationalism.

Most of the papers of this book were presented in the "IGU-LUCC 2003 Moscow Workshop on Global and Regional Land Use/Cover Changes" and at International Conference "Society and Environment Interaction Under Global and Regional Changes" which was held in Barnaul (Altai), Russia in summer 2003.