ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book provides an overview of general elections in Scotland and Scottish Parliament elections, as well as assessing why voters behave the way they do. Voters in Scotland have the opportunity to take part in elections for local councils, the Scottish Parliament, the UK House of Commons and the European Parliament. The majority of constituencies in Scotland are in and around the most populous city in Scotland, Glasgow, with larger constituencies in terms of geographic area located in the north and south of the country. The electoral system in use at general election, a simple plurality system often referred to as First-Past-The-Post(FPTP), is simple to understand. When it came to Scotland, electoral picture was not different: as much as the United Kingdom has never approximated a classic unitary state, in terms of electoral politics it for a long time looked very much like one.
