Nationalism is an ideology or movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, it presupposes the existence and tends to promote the interests of a particular nation,Smith, Anthony. Nationalism: Theory, Ideology, History. Polity, 2010. pp. 9, 25–30; especially with the aim of gaining and maintaining its sovereignty (self-determination) over its perceived homeland to create a nation-state. It holds that the nation should govern itself, free from outside interference (self-governance), that a nation is a natural and ideal basis for a polity, and that the nation is the only rightful source of political power.Yack, Bernard. Nationalism and the Moral Psychology of Community. University of Chicago Press, 2012. p. 142 It further aims to build, and maintain, a single national identity, based on a combination of shared social characteristics such as culture, ethnicity, homeland, language, politics (or government), religion, traditions, or belief in a shared singular history, and to promote national unity or solidarity. There are various definitions of a "nation", which leads to different types of nationalism. The two main divergent forms are ethnic nationalism and civic nationalism, though this dichotomy has faced criticism for oversimplifying diverse historical contexts.
The moral value of nationalism, the relationship between nationalism and patriotism, and the compatibility of nationalism and cosmopolitanism are all subjects of philosophical debate. Nationalism can be combined with diverse political goals and ideologies, such as conservatism (national conservatism and right-wing populism) or socialism (left-wing nationalism).Bonikowski, Bart and DiMaggio, Paul (2016) "Varieties of American Popular Nationalism" . American Sociological Review, 81(5): 949–980.
Nationalism is seen as positive or negative depending on its ideology and outcomes. Nationalism has been a feature of movements for freedom and justice, has been associated with cultural revivals,Smith, Anthony. Nationalism: Theory, Ideology, History. Polity, 2010. pp. 6–7, 30–31, 37 and encourages pride in national achievements. It has also been used to legitimize racial, ethnic, and religious divisions, suppress or attack minorities, undermine human rights and democratic traditions, and start wars, being frequently cited as a cause of both world wars.
Terminology
The terminological use of "nations", "sovereignty" and associated concepts was significantly refined with the writing by Hugo Grotius of De jure belli ac pacis in the early 17th century. Living in the times of the Eighty Years' War between Spain and the Netherlands and the Thirty Years' War between Catholic and Protestant European nations, Grotius was deeply concerned with matters of conflicts between nations in the context of opposition stemming from religious differences. The word nation was also applied before 1800 in Europe in reference to the inhabitants of a country as well as to collective identities that could include shared history, law, language, political rights, religion and traditions, in a sense more akin to the modern conception.
By the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the language surrounding nations and sovereignty became increasingly prominent in public discourse, legal documents, and popular mobilization. The expansion of mass literacy, print culture, and civic participation strengthened the perception that political authority derived from a people conscious of its shared destiny. This period also saw the spread of movements asserting that legitimate government must reflect the historical, cultural, and social character of the population it governs, rather than being imposed by dynastic accident or external force.
The twentieth century profoundly tested these assumptions. While the language of popular sovereignty was widely invoked, it was also systematically distorted by regimes that claimed to act in the name of "the people" while abolishing political pluralism, suppressing civil society, and subordinating national traditions to rigid, centralized doctrines. In several cases, historical identities were re-engineered or erased altogether, replaced by abstract social categories enforced through state coercion. The catastrophic human cost of such experiments—marked by mass repression, forced collectivization, and the elimination of independent institutions—contributed to growing skepticism toward any political model that dissolves national communities into ideological abstractions.
Nationalism as derived from the noun designating 'nations' is a newer word in the English language, dating to around 1798. The term gained wider prominence in the 19th century.See Norman Rich, The age of nationalism and reform, 1850–1890 (1970). The term increasingly became negative in its connotations after 1914. Glenda Sluga notes that "The twentieth century, a time of profound disillusionment with nationalism, was also the great age of globalism."Glenda Sluga, Internationalism in the Age of Nationalism (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013) ch 1
Academics define nationalism as a political principle that holds that the nation and state should be congruent. According to Lisa Weeden, nationalist ideology presumes that "the people" and the state are congruent.
History
According to Benedict Anderson, the rise of nationalism was related to the emergence of print capitalism and the proliferation of printed media in vernacular languages.
Beginning in the late 18th century, particularly with the French Revolution and the spread of the principle of popular sovereignty or self determination, the idea that "the people" should rule was developed by political theorists. Three main theories have been used to explain the emergence of nationalism: Primordialism developed alongside nationalism during the Romantic era and held that there have always been nations. This view has since been rejected by most scholars, who view nations as socially constructed and historically contingent. Perennialism, a softer version of primordialism which accepts that nations are modern phenomena but with long historical roots, is subject to academic debate. Modernization theory, currently the most commonly accepted theory of nationalism, adopts a constructivist approach and proposes that nationalism emerged due to processes of modernization, such as industrialization, urbanization, and mass education, which made national consciousness possible. Proponents of this theory describe nations as "imagined communities" and nationalism as an "invented tradition" in which shared sentiment provides a form of collective identity and binds individuals together in political solidarity. Ethnosymbolism explains nationalism as a product of symbols, myths, and traditions, and is associated with the work of Anthony D. Smith.
Intellectual origins Anthony D. Smith describes how intellectuals played a primary role in generating cultural perceptions of nationalism and providing the ideology of political nationalism:Smith, A.D. (1991). National Identity. Penguin. p.94.
Smith posits the challenges posed to traditional religion and society in the Age of Revolution propelled many intellectuals to "discover alternative principles and concepts, and a new mythology and symbolism, to legitimate and ground human thought and action".Smith, A.D. (1991). National Identity. Penguin. p.96. He discusses the simultaneous concept of 'historicism' to describe an emerging belief in the birth, growth, and decay of specific peoples and cultures, which became "increasingly attractive as a framework for inquiry into the past and present and ... an explanatory principle in elucidating the meaning of events, past and present".Smith, A.D. (1991). National Identity. Penguin. p.87.
The Prussian scholar Johann Gottfried Herder (1744–1803) originated the term in 1772 in his "Treatise on the Origin of Language" stressing the role of a common language. He attached exceptional importance to the concepts of nationality and of patriotism "he that has lost his patriotic spirit has lost himself and the whole world about himself", whilst teaching that "in a certain sense every human perfection is national". Erica Benner identifies Herder as the first philosopher to explicitly suggest "that identities based on language should be regarded as the primary source of legitimate political authority or locus of political resistance". Herder also encouraged the creation of a common cultural and language policy amongst the separate German states.
Dating the emergence of nationalism Scholars frequently place the beginning of nationalism in the late 18th century or early 19th century with the American Declaration of Independence or with the French Revolution, though there is ongoing debate about its existence in varying forms during the Middle Ages and even antiquity. The consensus is that nationalism as a concept was firmly established by the 19th century. In histories of nationalism, the French Revolution (1789) is seen as an important starting point, not only for its impact on French nationalism but even more for its impact on Germans and Italians and on European intellectuals.Raymond Pearson, ed., The Long-man companion to European nationalism 1789–1920 (2014) p. xi, with details on each country large and small. The template of nationalism, as a method for mobilizing public opinion around a new state based on popular sovereignty, went back further than 1789: philosophers such as Rousseau and Voltaire, whose ideas influenced the French Revolution, had themselves been influenced or encouraged by the example of earlier constitutionalist liberation movements, notably the Corsican Republic (1755–1768) and American Revolution (1775–1783).
Due to the Industrial Revolution, there was an emergence of an integrated, nation-encompassing economy and a national public sphere, where British people began to mobilize on a state-wide scale, rather than just in the smaller units of their province, town or family. The early emergence of a popular patriotic nationalism took place in the mid-18th century and was actively promoted by the British government and by the writers and intellectuals of the time. National symbols, anthems, myths, flags and narratives were assiduously constructed by nationalists and widely adopted. The Union Jack was adopted in 1801 as the national flag.Nick Groom, The Union Jack: The Story of the British Flag (2007). Thomas Arne composed the patriotic song "Rule, Britannia!" in 1740, and the cartoonist John Arbuthnot invented the character of John Bull as the personification of the English national spirit in 1712.