Yeah, but prior to, and in the campaign for, the IndyRef they had another substantive agenda that subsumed ideology and factionalism. Once defeated on that they've been compelled to adopt the anti-austerity position to maintain the 45...and it's worked.
this is correct.
Sturgeon herself always seemed more comfortable as an old Labour sort of socialist. Butchers rightly says there is a range of opinion amongst individuals in the SNP, but its policy base has been firmly social democratic since the days of Billy Wolfe in the 70s. Any to the right of that centre-left centre of gravity (and there aren't many in positions of prominence: Fergus Ewing and Mike Russell are about it) have kept quiet because they understand that tactically, the party can't be right wing and win the Labour heartlands they've always envied. And until devolution, that was the only way they'd be able to bring about independence.
The SNP has long been to the left of Labour. That isn't hard by the way. And still doesn't make them a socialist party.
Sturgeon as well as being personally inclined further left of Salmond, must have been mindful that the huge number of activists they've ingested since the referendum are largely a) politically naive (a good thing) and b) well to the left of the SNP's former centre of gravity. The new membership dwarfs the old membership. Last figure I saw was total membership in excess of 105,000. Before 18th sept it was 25, 500. This new membership wants stuff done.
One of the first things Sturgeon did was drop policies associated with Salmond - the corporation tax cut for an independent Scotland, for example. (It was amusing to see Darling attack the old policy, btw: Labour cut corporation tax on 3 occasions when last in power).
There are of course many neoliberal turns the SNP has taken while in government in Holyrood, though. For example they came to power deriding the former Labour/Lib Dem administration's PPP policies (a version of PFI), but their alternative, the Scottish Futures Trust, didn't seem to any clear thinking person very much different.
They have also have a tendency towards heavy centralisation and moralistic authoritarianism. (Kenny McAskill was the worst in this respect).
But that isn't really the point. The 80,000 new members didn't read the party's policy wallet before joining (really, they didn't, just look at their posts on social media), and nor are non members voting SNP doing so for their policy portfolio. I know Green Party members and SSP members who intend to vote SNP knowing full well that they disagree with many of their policies.
