15 - Conclusion

Summary

The story of Scotland's changing geography must be seen as a continuing narrative, yet it is necessary to draw an arbitrary line and take stock of the experiences already dealt with. It is time to reconsider the general ideas discussed in the introduction to see how the Scottish case relates to them. It is evident that Scotland achieved both modernisation and development after the union. As the study of the improving movement demonstrates (Chapter 4), this growth did not take place as a sudden discontinuous spurt in which agriculture played only a passive role. The fact that Scotland was not as wealthy as England should not be construed as backwardness that would spawn a superficial modernisation rather than comprehensive development. At the same time the rise of industry during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was not inevitable. Textiles provided the base for eighteenth-century expansion, for there was only a hint of the role that minerals (coal and iron ore) were destined to play in the future. A crop of iron furnaces emerged over a period of three decades between 1727 (Invergarry) and 1755 (Furnace), but although these works were outstanding for the Highland locations selected they used iron ore imported from England and consumed timber as fuel rather than coal. They appeared as a threat to Scotland's economic integrity, opening a prospect of Scottish resources being exploited by English business. Although the union gave the Scots unhindered access to the domestic and colonial markets of England and Wales there was no guarantee that this would allow a strong regional economy to emerge.