Neil Davidson

Neil Davidson (9 October 1957 – 3 May 2020) was a left-wing Scottish intellectual and activist, best known for his work in Marxist history and the modern history of Scotland. In 2003, his book Discovering the Scottish Revolution was awarded the Saltire Society's Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun Award and the Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize.

Early life Neil Davidson was born in Aberdeen to radiographer Dougie Davidson and secretary Margaret Davidson (née Farquhar). He had one sister, Shona,

Career Civil service After leaving school, Neil Davidson became a clerk in the Grampian Health Board, During this time, father and son both attended the same meetings of their trade union, NALGO. In 1987, he passed the civil service exam and began working for the Scottish Office.

Academic career Neil Davidson obtained a degree from the Open University (OU) in 1992 after five years of study,

After leaving the civil service, in 2008 Davidson was appointed at the University of Strathclyde. According to Gregor Gall, Davidson 'found it hard to enter academia because selection panels did not appreciate his work or its places of publication like Pluto.' and in 2003 received the Saltire Society's Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun Award and the Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize for Discovering the Scottish Revolution.

His subsequent Deutscher Memorial Lecture formed the basis of his 2012 magnum opus, How Revolutionary Were the Bourgeois Revolutions?, which 'comprehensively argued for the reinstatement of the concept of the "bourgeois revolutions" for the understanding of global modernity.'

In the 1990s, Davidson was a founder of the Edinburgh Campaign Against War in Europe, opposing NATO's involvement in the Yugoslav Wars. He helped to organise protests at the G8 summit in Scotland in 2005.

Having remained a 'thrawnly independent-minded' member through the 2000s, he left the SWP in 2013 during the internal crisis over the leadership's handling of rape allegations and helped to found Revolutionary Socialism in the 21st Century (rs21) in 2014.

Davidson was a supporter of Scottish independence, helping to establish the Radical Independence Campaign. He participated in the left-wing RISE alliance, which contested the 2016 Scottish Parliament election.

Personal life Whilst living in London in the 1980s, Neil Davidson's flatmate was author Andrew Murray Scott. Davidson met his life partner Cathy Watkins whilst they were both working at the Scottish Office. They moved together to Wester Hailes, Leith, and finally Cauther Ha' in West Lothian. In September 2019, during an international conference in Glasgow where he had debated with historian Robert Brenner, Davidson was rushed to hospital and diagnosed with a brain tumour. He died eight months later.

Select bibliography The Origins of Scottish Nationhood (Pluto Books, 2000), Discovering the Scottish Revolution 1692–1746 (Pluto Books, 2003) How Revolutionary Were the Bourgeois Revolutions? (Haymarket Books, 2012)