It initially consisted of just the SNP, but later included Slater and Harvie of the Scottish Greens as junior ministers after the two parties negotiated a power-sharing agreement.

[7] At the 2016 election, the ruling Scottish National Party (SNP) lost its parliamentary majority but was able to continue governing under Nicola Sturgeon as a minority administration.

[17] Carlaw resigned as leader in July 2020,[18] with Douglas Ross winning the subsequent leadership election unopposed.

[23][20][24] A BBC News report in April 2021 said that there were around 55,000 foreign nationals who had been given the right to vote as a result of these changes, including 20,000 refugees.

[26] This was passed by the Scottish Parliament on 25 February 2016 and received Royal Assent on 30 March 2016, setting the new date for the election as 6 May 2021.

[30] Parliament was in fact recalled on 12 April, to allow MSPs to mark the death of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

[31] James Dornan announced in February 2020 his intention to retire at the next Holyrood election,[64] but reversed this decision some months later.

[65] The SNP, Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats fielded candidates in all 73 constituencies and all eight of the regional ballots.

The Scottish Parliament uses an additional member system (AMS), designed to produce approximate proportional representation for each region.

[71] On 26 March 2021, the Alba Party was publicly launched by former First Minister of Scotland and SNP leader, Alex Salmond.

[76] The Action for Independence party, which had intended to pursue a similar list-only strategy, announced they would stand down their candidates in favour of Alba.

[79] The debate included key questions from the audience on the COVID-19 recovery, climate change, and a second referendum on Scottish independence.

[80] Commercial broadcaster STV held their leaders' debate on 13 April, moderated by their political editor Colin Mackay.

[86] Following Prince Philip's death on 9 April, the SNP, Conservatives, Labour, Greens and Liberal Democrats said they would suspend election campaigning until further notice.

[102] Some commentators put this down to unionists voting tactically for Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat candidates.

[103][104] According to psephologist John Curtice, "Denying the SNP an overall majority was, indeed, a collective effort – at least on the part of Unionist voters, who on the constituency ballot demonstrated a remarkable willingness to back whichever pro-Union party appeared to be best placed locally to defeat the SNP.

"[105] This was apparent in seats like Dumbarton, where incumbent Labour MSP Jackie Baillie saw her 0.3% majority increased to 3.9%, whilst both the Conservative and Lib Dem vote share decreased.

[106] In The National, Emer O'Toole questioned whether social media adverts with "a lack of transparency over funding" may have cost the SNP key seats as well.

[107] The day before the election, The Guardian reported that anti-independence groups and campaigners had "spent tens of thousands of pounds in the past week", including on Facebook adverts, calling for tactical voting to prevent the SNP getting a majority.

[108] One of these groups was Scotland Matters, whose founder, Professor Hugh Pennington said, "Across the country as a whole, tactical voting is obviously one of the ways forward to basically harm the SNP, not to put too fine a point on it.

Rob Johns, Professor in Politics at the University of Essex, said: "[W]e found a lot more switching than we had expected.

[7] Under the terms of the agreement, the Greens have two MSPs appointed as junior ministers in the government who are invited to attend cabinet meetings when their portfolios are being discussed.

The Greens signed up to the bulk of the SNP's policies, but in areas of disagreement such as international relations and fee-paying schools the two parties are free to publicly disagree.

[118] A deal that would see Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater made ministers was revealed on 26 August, subject to being voted upon by Green Party members.