Review of Bulmer and Solomos Nationalism and National Identities

This seminar provides an overview over various theories of nationalism and seeks to test their applicability through case studies since the early nineteenth century from Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Its aim is therefore to gauge the potential and the limits of what so far has been a distinctly Eurocentric brand of theorizing. A first part of the seminar familiarizes students with the most common theoretical approaches to the study of nationalism from an interdisciplinary perspective, framed around the well-known debate between modernists such as Ernest Gellner and primordialists such as Anthony Smith. A second part deals with a series of case studies, which aim at allowing for teasing out intercontinental comparisons as well as ideological transfers in the history of the spread of nationalism since 1800. The ultimate aim is to provide students with a firmer grasp of how manifold forms of nationalism have profoundly shaped our contemporary world.

Annual Review of Political Science, 2021

Amid the global resurgence of nationalist governments, what do we know about nationalism? This review takes stock of political science debates on nationalism to critically assess what we already know and what we still need to know. We begin by synthesizing classic debates and tracing the origins of the current consensus that nations are historically contingent and socially constructed. We then highlight three trends in contemporary nationalism scholarship: (a) comparative historical research that treats nationalism as a macropolitical force and excavates the relationships between nations, states, constitutive stories, and political conflict; (b) behavioral research that uses survey data and experiments to gauge the causes and effects of attachment to nations; and (c) ethnographic scholarship that illuminates the everyday processes and practices that perpetuate national belonging. The penultimate section briefly summarizes relevant insights from philosophy, history, and social psychology and identifies knowledge gaps that political scientists are well-positioned to address. A final section calls for more comparative, cross-disciplinary, cross-regional research on nationalism.

Modernism/modernity, 1995

Whatever nationalism is, whether ideology, civic religion, popular sentiment, or mass psychosis, its influence on modern society, politics, and art has been profound, perhaps more influential than the political movements of liberalism, fascism, and communism, all of which it underlay, interacted with, and powerfully defined. Whether analysts view nationalism as a beneficial or detrimental historical force, they tend to agree that this potent and multifarious phenomenon warrants sustained and rigorous analysis. The recent burst of academic studies is, in part, the product of that consensus. The current wave of nationalist movements around the globe not only provides powerful additional evidence for this assertion, but also presents interesting difficulties for those who study the topic. The three works under review here provide an opportunity to consider the challenges of analyzing nationalism in what is an increasingly nationalistic moment. In their respective strengths and weaknesses, these books confirm that our efforts to come to terms with nationalism as an historical artifact are always entangled to some extent with our sense of it as a contemporary political problem, and therefore, that we need to find ways of dealing with that entanglement in an honest and productive manner, so that we can elucidate nationalism without unwittingly perpetuating the errors that characterize its history.

alter the arrangement.) (1) This Westphalian Peace, as is widely believed, heralded the system of nation-states in Europe. However, this peace should be understood in the sense of Orwellian doublespeak. The Westphalian system ushered in a new series of national wars for hegemony in Europe and in colonies -and through a number of local wars, Napoleonic campaign, Franco-Prussian war , this process went on upto the two world wars in the twentieth century, and even beyond that up to the present time.

European Journal of Social Sciences Education and Research, 2015

Different events which happened in Europe made not only Europeans but people all over the world think that the efforts for creating a unified Europe, and a global village is threatening national identities and livelihoods. Although globalization is considered as a buzzword of modern era, nationalism, too, is very much alive in its own way. Nationalism is not only expected to persist but also increase and intensify in response to and in opposition to forces of globalization. Thus according to Anthony Giddens, “the revival of local nationalisms, and an accentuating of local identities, is directly bound up with globalizing influences, to which they stand in opposition.”(Giddens, 1994:5).Therefore this paper will try to answer the question: Is there a link between nationalism and globalization? Can these two forces be complementary rather than contradictory? Is their existence a battle of winners and losers? The paper will shortly see the pros and cons and the implications of these for...

Introduction for the volume Nationalism in a Transnational Age, co-ed. with Carsten Schapkow (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2021). Nationalism was declared to be dead too early. A postnational age was announced, and liberalism claimed to have been victorious by the end of the Cold War. At the same time postnational order was proclaimed in which transnational alliances like the European Union were supposed to become more important in international relations. But we witnessed the rise a strong nationalism during the early 21st century instead, and right wing parties are able to gain more and more votes in elections that are often characterized by nationalist agendas.

Changing Societies & Personalities, 2020

2008

By way of concluding this book, I want to recapitulate the multiple accounts of nationalism that crisscross through the preceding chapters. At one level, the chapters describe nationalism, its rise, its different manifestations, and its important facets. Clearly, as the chapters reflect, there are disagreements about what various scholars have to say about nationalism and its patterns. At another level, then, are the questions of how to approach nationalism and what broader themes are encoded within its idiom, such as race, gender, sexuality, and ethnicity. A culturalist approach to nationalism is shaped by, but also critical of, what are loosely described as modernist theories of nationalism. Partly shaped by Anderson and Hobsbawm's insights, the culturalist approach sees nationalisms as modern phenomena that are conceived, but are not unreal. I also want to emphasize that this is not to simply acknowledge that nationalisms are culturally constructed but to push the argument further: that nationalisms need to be continually imagined, reproduced, and reiterated in order for them to appear normal and natural. Therefore, a second point is that both the banal as well as the spectacular moments of nationalisms can provide important insights. The persisting influence of nations and nationalisms is not merely a factor in moments of crisis or spectacles such as independence-day celebrations in former colonies and the USA, for that matter. If anything, nations and nationalisms are woven through the fabric of everyday life. Third, a culturalist approach departs from modernist theories in two related ways: it argues against a single theory of nationalism and its origins; and it challenges Euro-Americancentered perspectives on nationalism that either disregard non-western

Nationalities Papers, 2023

This article reviews three recent books on nationalism each focusing on the different aspect of this multifaceted phenomenon. Mylonas and Radnitz's volume explores the relationships between nationalism and the politics of treason, Hadžidedic's book zooms in on the historical interdependence of capitalism and nationalism, while Maxwell's historical monograph explores nationalist habitus as a form of lived experience. These three insightful contributions show how diverse and plastic is nationalist ideology and practice.

Nationalism & Ethnic Politics, 1 (4): 143-5 (ISSN: 1353-7113)., 1996