Pe Nationalism Vladimir’s choice oscow,rosowto ano wasnt ANPIETRZAKhasjustone demand He'sntfussyaboutthe de Jisrotinecenteniatoch vith whichhe wants man thet fviary ove the tolsevicanmiesinaoao Bute does int thattmust etal than theaypmete (7 foo Place oF Culture and lence, given tie Folchnaton by Sta ‘uePctaat so gruff oldman with white airanda fine bushy moustache popular eneraner bestow fora pao son {hat became ar anthem for Soda inthesoBox Although the ‘Warsaw auhorites have baled a his rem of tampa arch hehe the Dakingof the Law and justice ary which forms the Ratignal government. twllbea symbol Re says: oung people vl now that Poland was vicorous ike Daag Square "he Bate of Warsaw nas indeed glsons. The Polsh amg facing uter ste miraculously stopped the Russians advance eetibeapal Yourcoreapondentmaried into fami that sil remenbeshow, dung ihe igtinggrandiatherLeon hada hos ez shot fom uncer hin, Twenty yeas ater a oles wee beng fined up and murdered inthe forest of Katya Rusin ofc he fo pated etumed the vou olring im te chotcecf te bul Teor the gulag Against the offcers advice Leon ated ive Comienviasonisneverjust aboutpast valourandsuteing itisaboutpesentpioiies Poland inthe gi of new ation asm Mr Bewekaye avr and justice which ok power n 25 theft governmenttose voles well tspederesors weree- sponsible "long tadon of betel and Weson” wih re Poet to Germany ad Rusia Not ong ago only afew hunded Done tuned up othe anal Independence Day parade. Tis Rovenberso.000 Poles manned. alongside wo ade atonal gioup ting banners saying"Clesn blood” and" The belief that nationalism could fae away was always naive. The real question is what form it will ake rope will be white or deserted”. ‘Wherever you look, nationalism is rising. Some times it takes the form of selfdeclared nations de ‘manding the right to determine thetr future: Catalonia in Spain and Kurdistan in Iraq, Scotland in Britain and Biafra in Nigeria. More often itis lurch tothe populist and reactionary right. The Altemative for Germany hhas won 94 seats in the Bundestag. Marine Le Pen of the National Front won a third of the vote in France's presidential election. In Hungary, Austria and the ‘Czech Republic nationalists have taken power, just as they did in Poland. In postreferendum Britain they have “taken backcontrol",orat east pretended o. Tur key is militant, Japan is shedding its pacifism, India is. toying with Hindu supremacy, China dreams of glory and Russiais belligerent ‘Most remarkable is the nationalist turn in the Un ited States. America was the first nation to declare it self independent ofall sovereigns save its people and. Constitution. It has always seen itself asa place apart. But for most ofits history this exceptionalism has been. a form of selFegarding universalism; in time, the rest. ‘of the world would catch up. Now ithas an angry, na tivist president who sees America not leading, but be inglef: behind~and vows tomake it great again. People who cross borders and cultures easily, and ‘who prosper as they do so, find this new nationalism disturbing. They see it hindering peaceful countries from trading, mingling and co-operating on the »|" Prous docs nobonslites views HE Pots national tw 2 pats The Econo! » world's problems. But they tend to think that it will pass, lke afe- ver. It may put off the day when the differences between nations finally melt away:it doesnot mean that day will never come. Thatis to brush aside what is happening far to lightly. Nation: alismis an abiding legacy ofthe Enlightenment. thas embedded itself in global politics more completely and more successfully than any of the Enlightenment’s more celebrated legacies, inclid- {ng Marxism, classical liberalism and even industrial capitalism. It isnotan aberration. Iishere to stay Puttingaside the concernsof a cosmopolitan lite thisisnotnecessarly a bad thing. Like religion, nationalismis capable of bringing outthebestin people as well as the worst Itcan inspire them to bind together freely in pursuit of the common good. Butt can also fill them with a terrifying, righ- teous certainty, breeding stife and injustice. ‘Sadly, the new nationalism plays to the paranoid, intolerant side ofthis legacy. It sees every “citizen of the world” as a “citizen of nowhere’, in the mocking phrase of Theresa May, Britain's prime minister. When the citizens of the world call them bigots, ‘thenationalistsretortthat the citizens of nowhere aretraitors. That ‘tums polities into a test of loyalty. When nations eye each other ‘with contempt, the global order which was stitched together after the second world war under American leadership starts to come asunder. Geopolitics becomesa free-for-all To see where this leads you need a handle on what national- {sm is and how it works. What connects a skinhead wrapped in, the flagofSt George toa granny wavingat the Queen with aUnion Flag on a stick When Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the head of Law and Justice, whips up one of the mass-meetings at which he peddles conspiracy theories on a chilly Tuesday evening, what alchemy persuades each member of his audience that he issummoning an ancient and personal loyalty? Why would someone avoid talking, {oa tranger on the bus butlay down hee life forhim on the battle field? The answers draw on politics, philosophy and psychology. But they begin with history. Cl N= have existed for centuries. Nationalism came of age in Vaimy, in northern France, on September 20th 1792, round aboutnoon, ‘That was when, inan engagement as mythologised asthe Bat tle of Warsaw, French vohinteers confionted a superior army of Prussian regulars under the Duke of Brunswick. Inthe crucial mo- ‘ment, General Frangois Kellermann brandished his hat on the end. of his sword and roared “Vive a nation!” From battalion after bat: talion the cry went up, a wave that carried the citizen-soldiers to ttiumph. {twas the first victory of the Revolutionary War,claimed forthe nation not the king. tinspired the National Convention in Paristo bbedone with the monarchy. A stunned Europe grasped thatthe di vine rule of kings really was coming to an end. The order that re- placed itwas built on three philosophical claims: 2) Legitimacy isnot handed down from God; it surges up from the people. Thinkers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau and John Locke drew on a well-established sense of nationhood, particularly vis: ‘ble in England, o explain how individual citizens have the right tojoin freely ina nation that will protect and benefit them. Three years before Valmy, Article Il of the Declaration of the Rights of ‘Man had said: “The principle of ll sovereignty resides essentially inthe nation. No body nor individual may exercise any authority ‘which does not proceed directly rom the nation, 2) Government is not just an agreement between individuals, butalso a statement ofthe nation’s general will. As Rousseau ar 4gued, individual rights can be qualified:a state wieldsits powerin ‘the name of the collective. Scholars quarrel over whether Rous eau: meant to trample on individual rights or protect them from the majority, but governments have used and abused the princi ple ever since. F 3) Each nation is diferent. By the time Napoleon was invading game of nations Number findependent stater* oahu of [Moegree Unfit —leeviss ‘eran hip eof-——~«0 sesh ee na a ee ee his neighbours, France's fraternal claim to be spread: ing the universal virtues ofliberty and equality looked to the rest of Europe very much like brazen conquest. German thinkers tumed to the philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder, who insisted that each nation is, shaped by itsown unique pastand thatits trueessence emerges from history, culture and, ultimately,race. The French could not impose their version of liberty and equality; only Germans could know what those ideas mean for the powers and principalities that would ‘eventually form Germany. Nationalism slips and slides between these three divergent claims. Flag-waving patriots who get weepy over the Olympic games and the poems of Rudyard Kipling draw on history and culture, but go easy on the ‘general will Civic nationalists, from places like Brazil, ‘America and Australia that ae largely made up of im: ‘migrants, exalt universal values and the example theit nation sets in pursuing them. They dally with Rous seau’s general will, urging newcomers to assimilate, bbut tread lightly om race and culture, which are not shared. Ethnic nationalists mine race and history (0 cteate a politics that sacrifices individual liberty tothe will ofthe majority. Some seek to have the good parts of this melange ‘without the bad. Thinkers ike George Orwell and Elie Kedourie have argued that patriotism—tolerant, wel- comingand easonable-relly has nothingto do with nationalism. tisa comforting thought it separates de- cent people from the bigots who cling blindly to their ‘own nation’s superiority: But one person's patriotism is another’s prejudice. In 197 the Indian writer Rabin dranath Tagore lamented how “the people which loves freedom perpetuatesslavery inalarge portion af the world with the comfortable feeling of pride in hav: ing done its duty.” Genial English patriots were blind tothe harm they caused. ‘Thelate Benedict Anderson, an ish political scien tist called modern nations “imagined communities"— imagined because people are drawn together within them who havenot met and never will tis the power ofsuch imagination thatallowsan essentially modern docttine like nationalism to feel so deeply rooted in the past. Today's Polish nationalists hark back to the country’s commonwealth with Lithuania, which atts height, in the 7th century, was one of Europe's great powers. Zimbabwe takes its name from ruins aban: doned hundreds of years before the country’s bound: aries were carved out by colonialiss. Germany's oth: century nationalists romanticised the wibes who fought the Roman legions-which is why Wagner bs. ek, toi Ofer amerrbe SAE