The aftermath of the independence has confounded conventional political wisdom. Take the nostrum that ‘a rising tide lifts all boats’. The historic popular engagement (judged not just by the voter turnout but also by the tens of thousands campaigning and attending public meetings on politics) has been the tide. But the occupants of all the risen boats don’t all now look the same. Examine their faces – the victors don’t look particularly happy while the vanquished look more optimistic than you’d ordinarily expect. Labour has suffered significant collateral damage – something approaching hatred towards it by many (especially in the four majority ‘yes’ regions and its former heartland of the west of Scotland) and no doubt many resignations too. The SNP has enjoyed by far the most unprecedented growth of any modern political party on these isles in such a short space of time, more than doubling its size in less than a week after the referendum. The Greens and the SSP have also recorded massive growth. More widely, the others parts of the pro-independence milieu (like the Radical Independence Campaign and Women for Independence) have not shut up shop and returned to other pastimes. Not only has the dynamic been defiance of the 45% but also the unravelling of the unionist parties’ enhanced devolution vow.

Where does this leave the left? The Red Paper Collective and Socialism First were the mainstays of the left arguing against independence. Their motto was ‘don’t paint nationalism red’. Unless they are keeping their light under the bushel, they seem to be no stronger than they were before the referendum. The sea they swim in is a smaller one now as Scottish Labour Party membership is in huge decline and they have no King Canute powers to turn its tide towards accepting neo-liberalism. Labour’s late in the day promises that voting ‘no’ was the road to social justice – especially from the big Westminster beasts and not our own parliament’s pygmies’ – look increasingly hollow after Ed Ball’s promise at Labour’s conference of no new spending through borrowing (or increases in personal and corporation tax). And that was long after Johann Lamont’s ‘we can’t carry on living in a something for nothing society’ contribution. Despite valiant efforts by Unite, austerity-lite will greet us if Labour wins in 2015.

Analytically, so far so good? But what of the opposition, especially the SNP? It has to take account of the effect that the pendulum in the political process has swung back towards the politicians after ‘the people have spoken’. We’ve been here before – outrage and defiance against the result. Remember Scotland United in 1992? Up like a rocket and down like a stick would be the confirmation of a political nostrum in its case. It’s not just that this happen in Scotland. Recall the fate of the likes Ya Basta! in Italy in the midst of the alter-globalisation movement of the early 2000s. The one counterexample is the rise of Podemos (‘We can’) in Spain – a movement emanating from the Indignados, Izquierda Anticapitalista and Izquierda Unida that has become a party (or added a party to its portfolio) and made a breakthrough by gaining 5 MEPS and 125,000 members. It was only founded in January 2014. It looks like it will avoid the trajectory of the Five Star movement in Italy led by Beppe Grillo. Can a Scottish Podemos emerge out of the fractured pro-independence left in Scotland?

Political parties can organise around elections such as the forthcoming 2015 and 2016 ones. They can even try to make them into de facto referenda. But the challenge for movements is a different one entirely. They measure success in different terms. So where is their organising focus now and what counts as success? And was the ‘movement’ for independence actually a movement (as so commonly asserted)? Over a longer period of time, there will undoubtedly be a demobilisation of what passed for the independence movement. You only have to remember what happened to Obama’s ‘Yes we can’ bandwagon in 2008. Clearly, many have chosen to join the SNP but that is a fraction of the 1.6m that voted ‘yes’ and the many tens of thousands that engaged more actively in politics.

But that demobilisation questions what movements are – can genuine social movements be so directly generated from above and exist for such short periods of time? Questions of democracy are in the ascendancy but they cannot trump questions of the importance of social democracy and social justice in the majority of citizens’ minds. Who will step up to the plate to stop the cuts? Devolution is a ‘dented shield’ operation and the SNP’s position is to stop things getting worse rather than reverse and return back in time to something far superior. This means that any sense of an independence movement transmogrifying into a mobilised anti-austerity alliance will be sorely tested (even though the ‘yes’ vote was primarily an impulse for social change not nationalist separation).

The fault line of class has to emerge. It will be both divisive and unifying – both weakening and strengthening. The SNP is a cross-class left of centre party. It will be more left wing under Nicola Sturgeon. But the dull reality of its neo-liberal economic perspective will still trump its social justice instinct. This will be played out over the issues of whether to use the Scottish Parliament’s existing and future tax varying powers.

The SNP did not provide enough hope to overcome the fear. The same cannot be said of the Radical Independence Campaign and the Commonweal. But both are not class orientated either with their respective, and rather populist, ‘Britain is for the rich – Scotland can be ours’ and ‘All of us first’ platforms.

The referendum has unleashed a battle between change and continuity where we are between something started and something not yet ended. It will continue for some time to come. Interesting times, indeed but we must go beyond this. The Scottish Left Review will continue to be a forum for the expounding of different perspectives and arguments on the left as it has been since it was established in 2000 by Jimmy Reid.

This edition – and the issues contained herein – is no different if, nonetheless, considerably more important than before. Contributors were asked to explain the results in their view and map out where to go next in terms of the left.

In the not too-distant future, there will be a time for talking and debating to take something of a backseat to political reconfiguration and collective action. Otherwise a window of opportunity will close, and we will experience a backward revolution – a 360 degree return to where we don’t want to be, namely, another wrecking, neo-liberal Tory government whose foundations are supported by popular demoralisation and disillusionment.

• We would very much welcome any responses – by way of letters of up to 400 words – to this editorial and the articles in this issue. They will be included in the next issue so please send them in by Friday 31 October. The email address is G.Gall@bradford.ac.uk

• Along with the chair of the editorial board, Bob Thomson, we would like to record our thanks to Robin McAlpine for all his effort, energy and ideas in editing and producing Scottish Left Review between 2001 and the last issue (82). Robin has stood down in order to concentrate upon the Commonweal. We wish him and the Commonweal well in their endeavours.

• Finally, in the New Year, Scottish Left Review Press – the sister to this magazine – will begin the work to put together a new and revised third edition of the consistently popular Is there a Scottish road to socialism? edited book. The first was published in 2007 and the second in 2013