Scotland, administrative division of the United Kingdom, occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain. Scotland is bounded on the north by the Atlantic Ocean; on the east by the North Sea; on the southeast by England; on the south by Solway Firth and by the Irish Sea; and on the west by the North Channel and by the Atlantic Ocean. As a geopolitical entity Scotland includes 186 nearby islands, a majority of which are contained in three groups—the Hebrides, also known as the Western Isles, situated off the western coast; the Orkney Islands, situated off the northeastern coast; and the Shetland Islands, situated northeast of the Orkney Islands. The largest of the other islands is the Island of Arran.
England - 47 boroughs, 36 counties*, 29 London boroughs**, 12 cities and boroughs***, 10 districts****, 12 cities*****, 3 royal boroughs******; Barking and Dagenham**, Barnet**, Barnsley, Bath and North East Somerset****, Bedfordshire*, Bexley**, Birmingham***, Blackburn with Darwen, Blackpool, Bolton, Bournemouth, Bracknell Forest, Bradford***, Brent**, Brighton and Hove, City of Bristol*****, Bromley**, Buckinghamshire*, Bury, Calderdale, Cambridgeshire*, Camden**, Cheshire*, Cornwall*, Coventry***, Croydon**, Cumbria*, Darlington, Derby*****, Derbyshire*, Devon*, Doncaster, Dorset*, Dudley, Durham*, Ealing**, East Riding of Yorkshire****, East Sussex*, Enfield**, Essex*, Gateshead, Gloucestershire*, Greenwich**, Hackney**, Halton, Hammersmith and Fulham**, Hampshire*, Haringey**, Harrow**, Hartlepool, Havering**, Herefordshire*, Hertfordshire*, Hillingdon**, Hounslow**, Isle of Wight*, Islington**, Kensington and Chelsea******, Kent*, City of Kingston upon Hull*****, Kingston upon Thames******, Kirklees, Knowsley, Lambeth**, Lancashire*, Leeds***, Leicester*****, Leicestershire*, Lewisham**, Lincolnshire*, Liverpool***, City of London*****, Luton, Manchester***, Medway, Merton**, Middlesbrough, Milton Keynes, Newcastle upon Tyne***, Newham**, Norfolk*, Northamptonshire*, North East Lincolnshire****, North Lincolnshire****, North Somerset****, North Tyneside, Northumberland*, North Yorkshire*, Nottingham*****, Nottinghamshire*, Oldham, Oxfordshire*, Peterborough*****, Plymouth*****, Poole, Portsmouth*****, Reading, Redbridge**, Redcar and Cleveland, Richmond upon Thames**, Rochdale, Rotherham, Rutland****, Salford***, Shropshire*, Sandwell, Sefton, Sheffield***, Slough, Solihull, Somerset*, Southampton*****, Southend-on-Sea, South Gloucestershire****, South Tyneside, Southwark**, Staffordshire*, St. Helens, Stockport, Stockton-on-Tees, Stoke-on-Trent*****, Suffolk*, Sunderland***, Surrey*, Sutton**, Swindon, Tameside, Telford and Wrekin****, Thurrock, Torbay, Tower Hamlets**, Trafford, Wakefield***, Walsall, Waltham Forest**, Wandsworth**, Warrington, Warwickshire*, West Berkshire****, Westminster***, West Sussex*, Wigan, Wiltshire*, Windsor and Maidenhead******, Wirral, Wokingham****, Wolverhampton, Worcestershire*, York*****; Northern Ireland - 24 districts, 2 cities*; Antrim, Ards, Armagh, Ballymena, Ballymoney, Banbridge, Belfast*, Carrickfergus, Castlereagh, Coleraine, Cookstown, Craigavon, Down, Dungannon, Fermanagh, Larne, Limavady, Lisburn, Derry*, Magherafelt, Moyle, Newry and Mourne, Newtownabbey, North Down, Omagh, Strabane; Scotland - 32 council areas; Aberdeen City, Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, The Scottish Borders, Clackmannanshire, Dumfries and Galloway, Dundee City, East Ayrshire, East Dunbartonshire, East Lothian, East Renfrewshire, City of Edinburgh, Falkirk, Fife, Glasgow City, Highland, Inverclyde, Midlothian, Moray, North Ayrshire, North Lanarkshire, Orkney Islands, Perth and Kinross, Renfrewshire, Shetland Islands, South Ayrshire, South Lanarkshire, Stirling, West Dunbartonshire, Eilean Siar (Western Isles), West Lothian; Wales - 11 county boroughs, 9 counties*, 2 cities and counties**; Isle of Anglesey*, Blaenau Gwent, Bridgend, Caerphilly, Cardiff**, Ceredigion*, Carmarthenshire*, Conwy, Denbighshire*, Flintshire*, Gwynedd, Merthyr Tydfil, Monmouthshire*, Neath Port Talbot, Newport, Pembrokeshire*, Powys*, Rhondda Cynon Taff, Swansea**, Torfaen, The Vale of Glamorgan*, Wrexham
The population of Scotland (1996 estimate) was 5,128,000. The population density was about 65 persons per sq km (169 per sq mi). The highest density is in the Central Lowlands, where nearly three-quarters of the Scots live, and the lowest is in the Highlands. About two-thirds of the population are urban dwellers.
The people of Scotland, like those of Britain in general, are descendants of various racial stocks, including the Picts, Celts, Scandinavians, and Romans. Scotland is a mixed rural-industrial society. Scots divide themselves into Highlanders, who consider themselves of purer Celtic blood and retain a stronger feeling of the clan, and Lowlanders, who are largely of Teutonic blood.
The Picts, a fierce and warlike people, successfully resisted conquest by the Romans, whose great general, Gnaeus Julius Agricola, led the first invasion of Caledonia late in the 1st century ad. Agricola and his legions pushed northward to the Firth of Forth. The border Picts, probably joined by rebellious Britons, strenuously contested Roman sovereignty in the region between the firths of Forth and Clyde. In AD 122, to ward off the Pictish threat to the imperial positions in northern Britain, the Roman emperor Hadrian ordered construction of a rampart from Solway Firth to the mouth of the Tyne River. Remnants of this rampart, known in history as Hadrian’s Wall, are still extant. Two decades later another rampart, called the Antonine Wall, was constructed from the Firth of Forth to the Firth of Clyde.
After the Roman withdrawal from Britain in 409, the Picts systematically raided the territories of their southern neighbors. The latter, however, soon put an end to these raids, probably with the assistance of the Saxons, one of the Germanic tribes that subsequently subjugated the Britons. In the course of the Germanic conquest many Britons withdrew into the Caledonian region between the Firth of Clyde and Solway Firth, and there laid the foundations of what became the kingdom of Strathclyde. The adjacent region to the north was occupied toward the beginning of the 6th century by the Scots, Celtic invaders from northern Ireland, who established the kingdom that became known in history as Dalriada. About the middle of the 6th century the Angles, a people who were related to the Saxons, overran most of Caledonia south of the Firth of Forth and east of Strathclyde. Together with the extensive Angle holdings in the north of what is now England, this region became the kingdom of Northumbria.
Many Scottish nobles and the overwhelming majority of the Scottish people bitterly resented English interference in their national affairs. Acceding to popular demand for termination of English control, Baliol in 1295 formed an alliance with France, which was then at war with England, and summoned his people to revolt. The first phase of the Scottish war of independence ended victoriously for Edward, who crushed Baliol’s army at Dunbar in April 1296 and decreed the annexation of Scotland to England. Baliol was deposed, and his kingdom was placed under military occupation.
Clans, the traditional keystone of Scottish society, are no longer powerful (see Clan). Originally, the clan, a grouping of an entire family with one head, or laird, was also important as a fighting unit. The solidarity associated with clan membership has been expanded into a strong national pride. The Puritan zeal of Scottish Presbyterianism, which is traceable to John Knox, the 16th-century religious reformer and statesman, is also strong. Popular sports of Scottish origin include curling and golf.
Bagpipes, usually associated with Scottish music, were probably introduced by the Romans, who acquired them in the Middle East. Scottish music is noted for the wide use of a five-tone, or pentatonic, scale. Folk tunes are not standardized, and a single song may have hundreds of variations in lyrics and music.
More than three-fourths of the land is used for agriculture; approximately equal areas are devoted to farming and grazing. The most important crops are wheat, oats, and potatoes. Other crops include barley, turnips, and fruit. Livestock and livestock products are also of major importance. Sheep are raised in both the Highlands and island groups and the Southern Uplands. Scotland is also known for its beef and dairy cattle and for its dairy products.
British society is increasingly middle class in numbers and outlook, and maintaining a high standard of living is a top priority. Material possessions, such as the family home, car, appliances, and clothes, are important, and many families take vacations abroad. The well-being of children is highly regarded, and British middle-class families often make substantial investments in order to provide the best education and life-enriching opportunities for their children.
British houses are made with concrete blocks or concrete-like building materials because the dampness of the climate causes wood to rot. Central heating is now widespread; previously, individual fires or heating devices were used.
Scotland has a very irregular coastline. The western coast in particular is deeply penetrated by numerous arms of the sea, most of which are narrow submerged valleys, known locally as sea lochs, and by a number of broad indentations, generally called firths. The principal firths are the Firth of Lorne, the Firth of Clyde (see Clyde), and Solway Firth. The major indentations on the eastern coast are Dornoch Firth, Moray Firth, the Firth of Tay, and the Firth of Forth (see Forth). Measured around the various firths and lochs, the coastline of Scotland is about 3700 km (about 2300 mi) long.
England, like most of the island of Great Britain, was heavily forested, chiefly with oak and beech in the lowlands and pine and birch in the mountainous areas. Woodlands now constitute about 8 percent of the total land area. Various types of fruit trees are cultivated, including the cherry, apple, and plum. A common shrub is a species of furze known locally as gorse. Numerous varieties of wildflowers are also found. An estimated 30,000 animal species live in Britain, although many have limited distribution and are on the endangered list. Britain has many smaller mammals, and the larger ones tend to be gentle. The only surviving large mammals are red deer, which live in the Scottish Highlands and in Exmoor in southwestern England, and roe deer, found in the woodlands of Scotland and southern England. Semiwild ponies also inhabit Exmoor and the Shetland Islands. At one time wild boars and wolves roamed Britain, but they were hunted to extinction.
About 80 percent of the land in Wales is used for agricultural purposes. In general the raising of livestock, mainly beef and dairy cattle and sheep, is more important than crop cultivation. Crops include barley, oats, potatoes, and hay. Forests cover about 12 percent of the land, and government reforestation programs are gradually increasing the area. The fishing industry is concentrated along the Bristol Channel.
Many aspects of the economy of Scotland are covered in the article on the United Kingdom. The currency of Britain is the legal tender of Scotland. Both agriculture and industry are important in the economy of Scotland. The chief exports are petroleum and natural gas and manufactured goods, especially burlap, clothing, machinery, textiles, and whiskey. The chief imports are food and iron. The center of Scottish trade unionism is the Scottish Trades Union Congress, with an affiliated membership of more than 980,000.
Britain had the world’s leading economy: Its overseas trade thrived, its standard of living rose steadily, and its citizens pioneered industrial innovations. With the growth of the economies of other nations in the 20th century, the British economy remained relatively strong. It has continued to grow, and Britain remains a major producer of industrial goods and provider of services, as well as a center of world trade and finance. In the 20th century, Britons saw their per capita disposable income triple, an accomplishment all the more remarkable considering Britain’s size and limited natural resources. The skills and ingenuity of Britain’s highly trained workers, managers, and entrepreneurs have enabled the British economy to function well and provide for its large population.
The UK, a leading trading power and financial center, deploys an essentially capitalistic economy, one of the quartet of trillion dollar economies of Western Europe. Over the past two decades the government has greatly reduced public ownership and contained the growth of social welfare programs. Agriculture is intensive, highly mechanized, and efficient by European standards, producing about 60% of food needs with only 1% of the labor force. The UK has large coal, natural gas, and oil reserves; primary energy production accounts for 10% of GDP, one of the highest shares of any industrial nation. Services, particularly banking, insurance, and business services, account by far for the largest proportion of GDP while industry continues to decline in importance. The economy has grown steadily, at just above or below 3%, for the last several years. The BLAIR government has put off the question of participation in the euro system until after the next election, in June of 2001; Chancellor of the Exchequer BROWN has identified some key economic tests to determine whether the UK should join the common currency system, but it will largely be a political decision. A serious short-term problem is foot-and-mouth disease, which by early 2001 had broken out in nearly 600 farms and slaughterhouses and had resulted in the killing of 400,000 animals.
general assessment: technologically advanced domestic and international system
domestic: equal mix of buried cables, microwave radio relay, and fiber-optic systems
international: 40 coaxial submarine cables; satellite earth stations - 10 Intelsat (7 Atlantic Ocean and 3 Indian Ocean), 1 Inmarsat (Atlantic Ocean region), and 1 Eutelsat; at least 8 large international switching centers
English is the official language of the United Kingdom and is the first language of the vast majority of its citizens. The use of language is extremely important to Britain’s class structure. Some educated English people, regardless of their class origin, strive to free themselves of regional or local accents in order to sound like educated English-speaking people. Some people in England regard regional accents and slang as substandard.
Conservative and Unionist Party [Iain Duncan SMITH]; Democratic Unionist Party (Northern Ireland) [Rev. Ian PAISLEY]; Labor Party [Anthony (Tony) Blair]; Liberal Democrats [Charles KENNEDY]; Party of Wales (Plaid Cymru) [Ieuan Wyn JONES]; Scottish National Party or SNP [John SWINNEY]; Sinn Fein (Northern Ireland) [Gerry ADAMS]; Social Democratic and Labor Party or SDLP (Northern Ireland) [John HUME]; Ulster Unionist Party (Northern Ireland) [David TRIMBLE]
The United Kingdom is a parliamentary monarchy—that is, the head of state is a monarch with limited powers. Britain’s democratic government is based on a constitution composed of various historical documents, laws, and formal customs adopted over the years. Parliament, the legislature, consists of the House of Lords, the House of Commons, and the monarch, also called the Crown. The House of Commons is far more influential than the House of Lords, which in effect makes the British system unicameral, meaning the legislature has one chamber. The chief executive is the prime minister, who is a member of the House of Commons. The executive branch also includes Her Majesty’s Government, commonly referred to simply as “the government.” The government is composed of ministers in the Cabinet, most of whom are members of the House of Commons; government departments, each of which is responsible to a minister; local authorities; and public corporations. Because the House of Commons is involved in both the legislative and executive branches of the British government, there is no separation of powers between executive and legislature as there is in the United States.
Legal system: common law tradition with early Roman and modern continental influences; no judicial review of Acts of Parliament; accepts compulsory ICJ jurisdiction, with reservations; British courts and legislation are increasingly subject to review by European Union courts
Suffrage: 18 years of age; universal
Executive branch: chief of state: Queen ELIZABETH II (since 6 February 1952); Heir Apparent Prince CHARLES (son of the queen, born 14 November 1948)
head of government: Prime Minister Anthony C. L. (Tony) BLAIR (since 2 May 1997)
cabinet: Cabinet of Ministers appointed by the prime minister
elections: none; the monarch is hereditary; the prime minister is the leader of the majority party in the House of Commons (assuming there is no majority party, a prime minister would have a majority coalition or at least a coalition that was not rejected by the majority)
Legislative branch: bicameral Parliament comprised of House of Lords (consists of approximately 500 life peers, 92 hereditary peers and 26 clergy) and House of Commons (659 seats; members are elected by popular vote to serve five-year terms unless the House is dissolved earlier)
elections: House of Lords - no elections (some proposals for further reform include elections); House of Commons - last held 7 June 2001 (next to be held by NA May 2006)
election results: House of Commons - percent of vote by party - NA%; seats by party - Labor 412, Conservative and Unionist 166, Liberal Democrat 52, other 29
note: in 1998 elections were held for a Northern Ireland Parliament (because of unresolved disputes among existing parties, the transfer of power from London to Northern Ireland came only at the end of 1999 and was rescinded in February 2000); in 1999 there were elections for a new Scottish Parliament and a new Welsh Assembly
Judicial branch: House of Lords (highest court of appeal; several Lords of Appeal in Ordinary are appointed by the monarch for life); Supreme Courts of England, Wales, and Northern Ireland (comprising the Courts of Appeal, the High Courts of Justice, and the Crown Courts); Scotland's Court of Session and Court of the Justiciary
International organization Member
AfDB, AsDB, Australia Group, BIS, C, CCC, CDB (non-regional), CE, CERN, EAPC, EBRD, ECA (associate), ECE, ECLAC, EIB, ESA, ESCAP, EU, FAO, G- 5, G- 7, G-10, IADB, IAEA, IBRD, ICAO, ICC, ICFTU, ICRM, IDA, IEA, IFAD, IFC, IFRCS, IHO, ILO, IMF, IMO, Inmarsat, Intelsat, Interpol, IOC, IOM (observer), ISO, ITU, MONUC, NAM (guest), NATO, NEA, NSG, OAS (observer), OECD, OPCW, OSCE, PCA, SPC, UN, UN Security Council, UNAMSIL, UNCTAD, UNESCO, UNFICYP, UNHCR, UNIDO, UNIKOM, UNMIBH, UNMIK, UNOMIG, UNRWA, UNTAET, UNU, UPU, WCL, WEU, WHO, WIPO, WMO, WTrO, ZC
1902 act also established scholarships for secondary education. An education act passed in 1944 and administered by the newly created Ministry of Education established free and compulsory secondary education up to age 15; this was increased to age 16 in 1973. An education reform act in 1988 allowed individual schools to control their own affairs and budgets, free from LEAs, and to receive grants directly from the government. It also established a controversial national curriculum, which was simplified in 1994 after complaints about its complexity. Legislation pertaining to education is laden with controversies because of education’s importance in Britain.
Military branches: Army, Royal Navy (includes Royal Marines), Royal Air Force
Military manpower - availability: males age 15-49: 14,599,199 (2001 est.)
Military manpower - fit for military service: males age 15-49: 12,139,930 (2001 est.)
Northern Ireland issue with Ireland (historic peace agreement signed 10 April 1998); Gibraltar issue with Spain; Argentina claims Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas); Argentina claims South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands; Mauritius and the Seychelles claim Chagos Archipelago (UK-administered British Indian Ocean Territory); Rockall continental shelf dispute involving Denmark and Iceland; territorial claim in Antarctica (British Antarctic Territory) overlaps Argentine claim and partially overlaps Chilean claim; disputes with Iceland, Denmark, and Ireland over the Faroe Islands continental shelf boundary outside 200 NM
Travel Forum
open Travel Forum
World Travel Forum
Write your own experience on Europe Travel includes each countries and cities, map, car rental, airfare, attractions, and hotels.
