In its most familiar nineteenth- and twentieth-century form, nationalism is the doctrine that each nation has a right to its own state, and that a state is legitimate only if it represents a nation. In more recent years, however, some nationalist movements—for example, the Welsh in the United Kingdom, the Kurds in Iraq—have been prepared to settle for something less than full political self-determination. Although these concessions may be born out of necessity, they suggest adopting a more moderate and inclusive conception of nationalism as the claim that a nation has a right to political recognition, perhaps a degree of autonomy within a federal structure, and that a state is legitimate to the extent that it provides that recognition.

But what is the nation? And what is it about the nation that justifies its claim to a privileged political status? There is a limit to the extent that we can provide general answers to these questions. But there are some general characteristics. Nationalism came on the scene with the idea that a group of people is constituted as a political community through a shared cultural identity, and (enough) people believe that this identity should take priority over others. There is an enormous variety in the constituents of this identity, not only between nations but within a nation at different times. Each nation does have its own story to tell, but the plot may change. Every nation does, however, appeal to a common history, a story of triumphs and disasters, of heroism and betrayal, through which the nation has come to be what it is. Every nation thinks of itself as having a homeland, which is described and celebrated in the nation’s art, literature, and music, and which provides the ground in a near literal sense of its national identity. Typically (though not universally), the national culture is based on a common written language, and members of the nation are able to communicate with each other through that language. The culture is also egalitarian: as Benedict Anderson (1991, 20) put it, the nation is “always conceived as a deep, horizontal comradeship.” This is, of course, compatible with considerable inequality of wealth, power, and prestige. The nation is like the God of the great monotheistic religions: all are equal in the eyes of the nation, if in nothing else. However, insofar as the nation is conceived as the basis of legitimate political rule, nationalism is a populist doctrine: sovereignty is located in the people.

Nationalism is the doctrine that a community, united by land, history, and language, has a claim to political recognition. The more visible nationalist movements of the nineteenth century—those of Germany, Italy, Greece, Poland, and many others—sought to remake political borders so that they would correspond to the aspirations of the nations they claimed to represent. It is possible, however, to recognize earlier, less strident versions. English borders were, more or less, secure by the sixteenth century; they were extended by the incorporation of Scotland in 1706. (The attempt to include Ireland was much less successful.) A conception of England, involving landscape (“this scepter’d isle”), religion (Protestantism), history, mythology (Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene was important), a cast of characters (the English yeoman, the squire), a literary tradition, even special modes of warfare (the long bow), had begun to play an important role in public discourse in the sixteenth century. When England and Scotland formed Great Britain it formed an unusual, but not unique, multinational nation (Canada and the old Soviet Union are other examples). While England and Scotland could continue to celebrate their distinct national identities—though a strong case has been made by Hugh Trevor-Roper (in Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983), that Scottish national identity was largely formed in the nineteenth century—they did so as parts of a larger nation, Britain. The monarchy, shared political institutions, and a common written language were important unifying factors. So too was Protestantism, and as this became less important in the nineteenth century, it was replaced by a shared imperial mission.

Eugène Delacroix, Liberty Leading the People (28th July 1830). (1830). Oil on canvas. Allegorical female figures have prominently stood for countries and their causes.

The story so far focuses on England and later Britain. Many scholars (Greenfeld 1992, Hastings 1997) have argued that England led the way into nationalism. And even Marx (2003), who places Spain first in the queue, with France and England close competitors, concedes that the nationalist project was more successful in early modern England than elsewhere. However, this leaves open the issue of whether there were even earlier forms of nationalism, perhaps elsewhere than in Europe. Hastings makes the interesting suggestion that Israel as depicted in the Old Testament served as a model for the early nationalist depictions of England. Certainly, the combination of culture, divine election, and political claims made on behalf of the Israelites has much in common with later nationalism. So too do the claims that Thucydides has Pericles make on behalf of Athens in his Funeral Oration after the first year of the Peloponnesian War. So we will need to look at the possibility of earlier—and perhaps non-European—forms of nationalism shortly.

Whether or not there are premodern examples, there is little doubt that nationalism reached its zenith in the modern world. Why has the modern world been so hospitable to nationalism? There are four interrelated features of the modern world that were conducive to the emergence of nationalism: politics, economies, the dissemination of text-based culture, and religious, racial, and ethnic exclusions.

Once we have a reasonably clear understanding of nationalism it becomes a broadly empirical question whether there were premodern nationalisms. There are, however, reasons to be skeptical. For much of world history, it would not have seemed plausible to accept the idea that the culture political elites shared with those over whom they ruled was the justification for their political rule. This does not mean that there were not latent cultural similarities between ruling elites and their subjects. Both John A. Armstrong (1982) and Anthony D. Smith (1986) have argued that the early nationalisms of western Europe were able to draw on the cultural resources these provided. (Both Armstrong and Smith conceive these similarities on ethnic lines. This is misleading. Religion and other cultural features were more important than descent.) But these cultural ties seem to have played relatively little political role and it would be a mistake to think of them as constituting nations in the modern sense. Perhaps something more akin to the nation came into existence when these communities were faced with a common enemy. It may be, for example, that a sense of French national identity emerged during the One Hundred Years War, and—even earlier—that Vietnamese, Burmese, and Korean national identities came into play as a response to the ongoing struggles with China. A different candidate for premodern nationhood were those small communities, such as ancient Israel and the Greek city-states (excluding the slaves), where there was not a large gap between rulers and citizens, and social life involved a number of common activities and rituals (military service, religion). In these cases, shared experience would have forged a common cultural identity. But this is a long way from the vast nation-states of the modern world.

This U.S. World War I poster advertising government bonds was aimed at citizens and immigrants. Library of Congress.

Whether or not there were premodern nationalisms, it was at best an intermittent occurrence. In the modern world, it has seemed inescapable. And it is easy to see why. Once the link between culture and state power had been established, political rule acquired a cultural dimension. This was recognized after the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, and the nineteenth century was the period of “official nationalism” (the term is taken from Seton-Watson 1997). States strove to legitimize themselves in cultural terms. Public displays, rituals, and ceremonials were deployed, and even invented, as part of this nation-building exercise. By contrast, old polyglot empires on the Austro-Hungarian or Ottoman models faced increasing difficulties as their states responded to the challenge of the modern world. The relative success of the United Kingdom in forging an overarching national identity shows that these difficulties were not insuperable. As states expanded their territory and increased their presence in everyday life, minority cultures were faced with a choice, either to accommodate to the dominant culture or to resist. The former choice meant assimilation or marginalization; the latter was the path of national resistance, as the minority culture sought a political embodiment. It may be, as Breuilly argued (1982), that nationalism provided the rhetoric in which intellectuals and political leaders voiced their opposition to metropolitan centers of power well before it became a presence in the consciousness of the people in whose name nationalist struggles were fought. But the rhetoric was—and remains—an effective one.

The sources of nationalism are to be found in the enormous structural changes that were taking place in western Europe in the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries. But it was quickly appropriated in the non-Western world. This does not mean that European models were simply translated, though African and Asian leaders and intellectuals were undoubtedly influenced by what they learned from Europe. Perhaps most important was the experience of European imperialism. Borders were drawn according to the exigencies of colonial rule, and resistance to that rule itself formed the national identities in whose name resistance was carried out. While postcolonial nations were able to draw on local traditions and history, national identities often faced difficulties when the unity gained though struggle was overtaken by other competing loyalties.

For the past two or three hundred years, the nation-state has provided the organizing principle within which much economic, political, and cultural activity has taken place. There is some reason to suppose that this is no longer the case. Production, and not merely exchange, increasingly takes place on an international scale. Improvements in transport and, massively, in communication, have placed even ordinary people in contact with people across state borders. The imperative of economic growth has led most states to subordinate some of their power to supranational agencies and global market forces. National cultures have fragmented along lines that bear little relation to political boundaries. As Hobsbawm (1993, 163) remarked, nationalism “is no longer a major vector of historical development.” But we should be very wary of predicting the demise of nationalism. The explanatory story sketched in above leaves a good deal of room for historical contingency. Whatever its origins, nationalism has become a historical force in its own right, not merely as a medium for other projects. Nations have been able to appropriate and create impressive cultural resources. States retain a good deal of residual power and are well aware of the potency of nationalism to support it. Whether or not globalization will eventually deliver prosperity and security, the contemporary reality for many is poverty and uncertainty. In these circumstances, it is not surprising that nationalism continues to attract the allegiance of states, oppositional groups, and—not least—ordinary people.

Nationalism, Ethnic; Nation-State