The Economist. THE rise of nationalism in many corners of Europe is often associated with a rising self-awareness of local cultural identity. Many say that a revival in local languages, such as Irish, Scots Gaelic and Catalon, and an increased interest in traditional cultural symbols, has boosted a sense of regional belonging in recent decades. In particular, the rise of the Scottish National Party and support for independence in Scotland has been associated with a resurgence in national feeling there. As we put it back in April 2012, although the long-term economic case for an independent Scotland is shaky: "[I]f Scots really want independence for political or cultural reasons, they should go for it. National pride is impossible to price."

A new paper* by Jim Tomlinson at Glasgow University suggests that this revival in separatist feeling may also be partly due to economic factors. As many have said before, the discovery of huge amounts of oil under the North Sea in the 1960s and 1970s and the poor performance of the Scottish economy under the Thatcher government in the 1980s have boosted support for a split from Britain.

But Mr Tomlinson goes further than this. The decline of Scotland's industrial sector and the impact of "deglobalisation" over the last century has made Scots more insular, he argues; what goes on in Edinburgh now seems more important to ordinary Scots than what happens in London, New York or Calcutta. Even as late as the 1950s this was not so; Scotland was one of parts of the world most deeply integrated into the global economy. Back then, the country produced more coal than it could burn, more steel than it could use and more ships than it could sail. Raw materials would come from all over the world to be turned into manufactured goods for export. As a result, the price of coal and steel in America or India was of more interest to the average Scotsman than the doings of the elites of Edinburgh or Glasgow. The union with the rest of Britain was the linchpin to this industrial success, offering unimpeded access to markets within Britain's empire.

However, since the 1950s, decisions made in Edinburgh—rather than the rest of the world—have become more important to the economic well-being of ordinary Scots. Exports of manufactured products have declined, particularly in the 1960s and 1970s, due to the collapse of the British Empire (historically the largest market for them). Industrial employment declined from 42% of the workforce in 1951 to just 11% by 2007. Sectors such as mining and steel almost completely disappeared over the period. In their place, the public sector grew in size, employing 37% of the population of cities such as Dundee by 2011, for instance. Today decisions about public spending by the devolved government in Edinburgh affect the economic fortunes of ordinary Scots more directly than fluctuations in the rest of the global economy, helping to create a sense of national identity around the local capital city. That has provided the fuel for the rising popularity of autonomy, as a result of the desire to have greater local control over the increasingly-important matter of fiscal policy.

Although the rise of nationalism cannot entirely be explained by economic forces, there are similar parallels to Scotland in other places of the world. Across the Irish Sea, over the past 50 years, the number of people self-identifying with a "Northern Irish" sense of identity, rather than a nationalist or unionist one, has increased, along with the share of the region's economy produced by the public sector (which recently peaked at 60% of output). In Catalonia, the decline of textile exports and the growth of public-sector employment has co-incided with growing demands for regional autonomy, and even independence from Spain, since the 1970s. Oddly enough, deepening integration across the global economy may help increase the attraction of old-time national insularity.

* J. Tomlinson, "The economic basis of Scottish nationhood c.1870-2014".