Political tolerance isn’t just for Christmas

SES Co-Investigator Professor Christopher Carman delves into our most recent survey data to explore whether Scotland really is the “welcoming and inclusive nation” it is often imagined to be.

For many years, Scotland has enjoyed a reputation—among commentators, politicians, and even some scholars—as an unusually open-minded and politically tolerant nation (e.g., McCrone 2017; Keating 2021). Images of a civic, inclusive political culture have become part of the story Scotland tells (itself) about itself.

Yet political science has long cautioned that public commitments to tolerance are often more fragile than they appear. Classic US-based research by Sullivan, Pierson, and Marcus shows that citizens frequently endorse democratic principles in the abstract while hesitating when confronted with groups or ideas they find objectionable (Sullivan et al. 1982; see also Gibson 1992). More recent studies across Europe suggest that rising political polarisation can quietly erode everyday norms of democratic forbearance (Foa & Mounk 2017; Gidron, Adams & Horne 2020).

Our latest findings from the Scottish Election Study suggest that Scotland is no exception.

Drawing on our nationally representative Scottish Opinion Monitor (Scoop) survey fielded in October (fieldwork by YouGov, sample 1,242), we find that levels of political tolerance in Scotland are considerably lower—and more uneven—than may be commonly assumed. When the principle of tolerance meets real-world cases, many Scots are less willing to extend political rights to groups they dislike, disagree with, or distrust. And these patterns matter: political tolerance is not just an abstract virtue but a cornerstone of a healthy democratic system.

Is (Political) Tolerance a Scottish value?

In 2005, Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown noted that, “Ask British people what they think important about our country – and one quality they highlight is our tolerance – ask about a characteristic that makes them ashamed and it is intolerance.”  In 2018 Conservative Prime Minister Teresa May said, “Britain’s liberal democracy has long been respected around the world for its tolerance and decency… [and] respect for those with different viewpoints.”

Far more recently Scottish First Minister John Swinney contrasted what he sees as the “prevailing [political] climate” south of the border which is “driving people apart and pushing people to the right,” with “the prevailing sentiment in Scotland” driven by “the cohesion of our society, the welcoming nature of our society, the way we position ourselves to be a country that brings people together….” 

The obvious contrast is with the statements made by Reform Party leader Nigel Farage, who, in advance of his 6 December visit to Falkirk, sought to emphasise a recent report in the Telegraph that used Scottish Government data to reveal that 29% of Glasgow school students speak English as “an additional language.” Farage argued, “This is not diversity, as the left always preaches. This actually is the cultural smashing of Glasgow. It is turning it into a completely different city in every way… Just think culturally, what it means for Glasgow and indeed, in many ways, for the future of Scotland.”

With the Reform Party running in second place behind the SNP (and ahead of all other parties) in our October survey, it raises the question of how much of Scotland’s civic narrative of a tolerant and welcoming nation holds true in today’s more polarised climate?

What do we mean by Political Tolerance?

Political tolerance is widely considered a cornerstone of a healthy democracy. It extends beyond simply accepting the existence of different viewpoints — it involves supporting the rights and freedoms of groups or individuals we fundamentally disagree with.

Classic democratic theorists such as John Stuart Mill argued that free expression and open contestation of ideas allow societies to correct their mistakes and avoid the dangers of silencing dissent. Later political psychologists like Sullivan, Piereson and Marcus (1982) showed that tolerance becomes truly meaningful only when it is tested: not in how we treat those who share our beliefs, but in how we respond to those whose views we find unsettling, offensive, or even threatening. In other words, political tolerance is not just a desirable democratic principle, but an essential one.

That said, political tolerance is often fragile. Decades of research show that while many citizens support democratic principles in the abstract, they can withdraw those commitments when confronted with groups they dislike in the real world. It is one thing to approve of freedom of speech as an ideal — and quite another to be comfortable extending that freedom to those we fear or consider harmful.

Below we explore new survey evidence from the Scottish Election Study, examining whether Scotland’s celebrated inclusive civic political identity is matched by public attitudes that uphold these foundational democratic values.

Measuring Political Tolerance

In our October Scoop Survey, we adapted the classic measurement strategy designed by Sullivan, Pierson and Marcus (1982). Respondents are presented with a list of several groups – some on the right of the political spectrum, some on the left – then asked which of the groups they like and dislike most. This is followed with a series of questions asking the extent to which respondents would be willing to tolerate members of their disliked group engaging in various political and social activities.

Using this approach, in October 2025 we asked our Scottish respondents which of the following groups they approved and disapproved of most:

• People protesting outside asylum hotels
• LGBTQ+ pride marchers
• Pro-Palestine activists
• Direct action environmentalists (like Just Stop Oil)
• Pro-life groups who oppose abortion
• Protestant marchers (like the Orange Order)

After selecting the two groups, respondents were then asked whether or not their most disliked should be:

• …allowed to make speeches in the community
• …allowed to hold public rallies and demonstrations
• …banned from holding public office
• …allowed to teach in secondary schools
• …banned from flying their group’s flags in public places

How tolerant are we?

Overall, 82% of respondents selected a “most disliked” group from the list provided. Given the popular narrative in Scotland, some may find the results surprising in that Scot’s do not express as much support for tolerance as might be expected. In the table below, we present the responses for each of the tolerance measures with the intolerant responses highlighted in bold.

Tolerance of most disliked group, all respondents

In all scenarios more than 50% of respondents selected the politically intolerant option. Making speeches in the community and flying the group’s flag in public places received the least opposition, with 54% and 58% being willing to say their disliked group should not be able to engage in these activities. 60% of respondents favoured banning members of their disliked group from holding public office and 61% said their disliked group should not be able to hold public rallies. A whopping 81% of our Scottish respondents said that members of their disliked group should not be able to teach in secondary schools.

This last one – 81% being willing to ban members of a group they dislike from teaching in schools –is perhaps the most striking. We should note that, as with all survey questions, respondents may be interpreting these items in different ways. It is possible that, say, respondents had in mind that members of their disliked group were going to be teaching specifically on topics by which they are identified (e.g. “LGBTQ+ pride marchers” or “Pro-life groups who oppose abortion” teaching about sexual education, rather than members of those groups teaching Higher maths). However, even if that is the case, the maximalist definitions of political tolerance would, as noted above, argue that tolerance is not supposed to be comfortable – in democracies the ideal is that citizens tolerant that which they might not like or agree.

But is everyone the same? Surely people on [select your side of the ideological divide] must be more committed to the democratic principal of tolerance than are people on the other side of the ideological divide.

That doesn’t seem to be the case. One of the most striking aspects of our findings is that people on the right and left – or, more accurately, people who selected groups on the left and right as their most disliked group – seem to be roughly equally intolerant of the other side.

Below we replicate the table above, dividing our sample by people who selected Right leaning groups and those who selected Left leaning groups as their least liked group.

Tolerance of most disliked group, respondents who selected Right leaning group

Tolerance of most disliked group, respondents who selected Left leaning group

In only two of these tolerance measures is there a statistically significant difference between people who selected groups on the right and groups on the left as their disliked groups. The “teach in secondary schools” and “flying flag in public” questions both revealed a statistically significant difference between the two groups, with those who disliked groups on the left being less tolerant.

So it seems that people who dislike groups on the right are a wee bit more tolerant, but there isn’t a great deal in it.  

Who is more (or less) intolerant?

The burning question now is who is more – or less – politically intolerant in Scottish society.

To get a sense for this, we combined the above measures to generate a single scale measuring political intolerance. To do this we “flipped” the two “banned” measures so they were running in the same direction as the other three items in the scale, then added all of the responses together.

Overall, the scale of political intolerance looks to have a roughly bell-shaped, though skewed, distribution (range 1-16, mean = 10.6 (s.d.=3.8))… until you notice the large spike at the least tolerant end of the scale. And, indeed the modal (most occurring) value in the scale is for those who selected the least tolerant responses across all of the scenarios presented.

We can then use linear (OLS) regression to see which of socio-political traits tend to predict greater or lesser degrees of tolerance.

Doing this, we do find differences between people who identified a group on the Left and those who identified a group on the Right as their least liked group.

For our SES respondents who disliked groups on the Left, it is interesting that only one of the standard socio-demographic variables (e.g., age, sex, social class, etc.) was a significant predictor of political intolerance – and that was racial/ethnic identity. Those people who identified as any of the standard BAME groups who selected Left leaning as a disliked groups tended to be more politically tolerant.

Beyond the demographics, it was more attitudinal variables that predicted intolerance, such as people who distrust experts, are opposed to immigration and tend to hold authoritarian values.

For those who disliked groups on the Right, older respondents tended to be more tolerant. Women tended to express higher levels of intolerance toward groups on the right.

In terms of the attitudinal measures, those who think the UK should rejoin the EU and people expressing greater degrees of authoritarianism tend to be less tolerant, whilst people on the ideological Left are ever so slightly more tolerant.

It is interesting to note that in both models, people with university degrees are no more or less tolerant than those without, and those who identify as belonging to a religious denomination are also no more or less tolerant than those who claim no religious belief.

Summing Up and Important Caveats

The story that Scotland tells of itself – namely that it is a uniquely tolerant and welcoming nation – may not quite be the full picture. The data collected by the Scottish Election Study in October 2025 shows that there could be some holes in that story.

Adapting a classic measure of political tolerance to Scotland, we find that a significant number of Scots express at least some politically intolerant views.

Of course, we need to remember that the measurement strategy created by Sullivan, Piereson and Marcus draws on an (implicit) assumption of a maximalist model of political tolerance. This maximalist perspective is reflected in Hall’s (1906) oft quoted summary of Voltaire’s philosophy, “I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”  Whilst democratic theory does push us toward rather classically “liberal” ideals of freedom of speech and public protest, it can be difficult to remember those democratic values when faced with a group one disdains marching in the streets.

Another important caveat to consider is the point of comparison in this analysis. Certainly, the levels of (in)tolerance expressed by Scots’ may be surprising. But, at the same time, these levels are not too far off those reported by James Gibson in his seminal research on tolerance in the United States in the late 1980s (Gibson 1992), where he found that roughly 82% of American survey respondents would ban members of their least liked group from teaching in schools (not unlike what we found in our October Scoop survey). And we are not aware of any recent attempts to use a similar approach to measuring political tolerance in, say, England. So, whilst the overall levels might be initially surprising, we do urge caution to avoid overinterpreting these findings, recognising that we do not have clear points of comparison with other British nations at this stage.

Appendix – Question Wording

Question 1
"These days there are a number of groups which operate outside of party politics but engage in political protests or campaigns.

You may not feel strongly about any of them but, if you had to choose the one that you **most like or approve of** and then the one that you **most dislike or disapprove of**, which would you choose in each case?" 

- People protesting outside asylum hotels
- LGBTQ+ pride marchers
- Pro-Palestine activists
- Direct action environmentalists (like Just Stop Oil)
- Pro-life groups who oppose abortion
- Protestant marchers (like the Orange Order)
- *Don’t feel at all strongly about any of them*

Question 2
"Please now think about [most disliked group] and leading figures in those groups. Do you think they should or should not be..."

- …allowed to make speeches in the community
- …allowed to hold public rallies and demonstrations
- …banned from holding public office
- …allowed to teach in secondary schools
- …banned from flying their group's flags in public places

Response options:
- Definitely should
- Probably should
- Probably should not
- Definitely should not
- Don't know