David Jessop, Contributor

A little over a week ago, Caribbean high commissioners to the United Kingdom paid a formal first visit to the Scottish Parliament which is located in Edinburgh.

This initiative came in response to an invitation extended by Lord George Foulkes, a long-time friend of the Caribbean who sits in both the upper house of the UK Parliament and in the Scottish Parliament.

In Scotland, the seven strong group from the Caribbean met with a wide range of senior figures from the ruling Scottish National Party (SNP), including the First Minister, Alex Salmond, and his Minister for Europe and External Affairs, Linda Fabiani.

Discussion in Parliament

They also held discussions with members of the Parliament's Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee, representatives of the SNP, their counterparts from the conservative and labour opposition, as well as with the Presiding Officer (Speaker) and officials.

Subsequent meetings enabled the diplomats to meet with Scottish business to discuss the possibilities for investment and trade with the Caribbean.

The issues covered were wide-ranging and included Scottish devolution, improving relations between the Caribbean and Scotland, the possible establishment of a cross party group on the Caribbean in the Scottish Parliament (there is already one on Cuba), improving relations through the appointment of honorary consuls, and the development of an annual exchange.

Speaking afterwards about the visit in his capacity as a member of the Scottish Parliament, George Foulkes observed that the Caribbean, Britain and Scotland shared the closest of historical ties, and that he looked forward to finding new areas for cooperation particularly in the field of trade and investment.

The visit is an interesting indication of the region being able to think forward, should Scotland ever seek and obtain a greater degree of autonomy from the rest of the United Kingdom. However, more immediately and realistically, it was an ideal precursor for Caribbean ministerial visits linked to investment and an opportunity to identify where the Scottish model, a significant modern advance on that of the United Kingdom as a whole, might have relevance to the region.

Scotland has a population of around five million people, and although much wealthier than almost all Caribbean nations, it has some interesting similarities with the region in its economy, in as much as it relies heavily on tourism, financial services and exports of alcohol (whisky), as well as on oil and offshore services and life sciences.

It has an outward-looking policy that supports Scottish business seeking to trade abroad, seeks to attract foreign investment and defends its interest in Brussels, but while the commonalties largely stop there the message does not.

Global identity

Its strategy is to manage Scotland's reputation as 'a distinctive global identity and an independent-minded and responsible nation at home and abroad, confident of its place in the world'.

This framework provides a rationale for its international activities and has led to the publication of plans that detail how it is seeking to engage with its neighbours in the European Union, with China, India and North America.

As a part of its approach, it has established integrated programmes that promote Scotland internationally as a destination for tourism and the site of world-class cultural events, and is targeting a 50 per cent rise in revenue from these sources by 2015.

It is also promoting 'Creative Scotland' by championing its creative industries in areas such as the design and manufacture of computer games.In the area of tourism the Caribbean could learn a lot from Scotland. It recognises that the industry is competing against some 200 other nations, and therefore needs to support its industry's marketing efforts, not least because it recognises that the impression each visitor gains has an influence on wider views about investment and trade.

It therefore promotes with the industry Scotland's cultural identity and heritage, its people, its natural environment, its history and iconic buildings and a range of 'signature' events, such as Edinburgh International Festival - a globally known mix of cultural events - and its golf.

Significant part

It also recognises that the Scottish diaspora across the world can play a significant part in supporting and promoting its interests, and has a 'Global Scots' programme and is planning 'a year of homecoming' in 2009, in part in order to harness this latent force for development.

It has identified nations that it sees as it comparators to aspire to. These are the Scandinavian nations of Norway, Finland, Iceland, and Denmark, as well as Ireland. And, unusually, despite its status as a devolved part of the United Kingdom, it has created development programmes and has a particularly strong relationship with Malawi.

These policies are, of course, being pursued by the Scottish National Party as a way of creating a close to sovereign identity for Scotland in the world. However, they do have a resonance with Caribbean thinking, and suggest an interesting model for nations in a region that at times seems unclear about where they are seeking to position themselves and their economic interests.

But above all, it is Scotland's social ethos and style of government that would seem to offer much to the Caribbean if it is to find new ways of thinking about governance. Visiting the Parlia-ment in Edinburgh is a strikingly different experience to visiting Westminster.

Accessible, transparent

The Scottish Parliament is unusually accessible and transparent to the Scottish people; it is socially driven and has a membership that is almost one-third female.

Its members do not have the remoteness or, for the most part, the confrontational political style that Westminster has. Its chamber is U-shaped and the process is more given to consensus. The language of Parliament is not archaic, and it is strikingly family-friendly with large numbers of schoolchildren visiting and sitting in the public galleries of the chamber.

For the Anglophone Caribbean locked into the Westminster model with all of its formality, confrontational style, arcane practice and its implied remoteness from the people, Scotland's parliamentary system and style offers a model worth studying, not least to see whether there might be ways in which adoption of best practice could rejuvenate Caribbean parliamentary democracy.

Clearly, Scotland is not the Caribbean, but if the high commissioners' visit to Scotland indicated anything, it was that there are important devolved and modern consensual and socially oriented models of governance in the United Kingdom that any nation which has inherited the British model might usefully learn more from.

David Jessop is director of the Caribbean Council. Email: david.jessop@caribbean-council.org