Nationalism

Nationalism and Politics

• Many political scientists have theorized about the foundations of
the modern nation-state and the concept of sovereignty.
• The concept of nationalism in political science draws from these
theoretical foundations.
• Philosophers like Machiavelli, Locke, Hobbes, and Rousseau
conceptualized the state as the result of a "social contract"
between rulers and individuals.
• Weber provides the most commonly used definition of the state,
"that human community which successfully lays claim to the
monopoly of legitimate physical violence within a certain territory".
According to Benedict Anderson, nations are "Imagined
Communities", or socially constructed institutions.
Nationalism in a Global Age
• The appeal to nationalism is strongly colored by regionalism,
xenophobia, and anti-immigrant sentiment. In this instance,
nationalism becomes a new form of localism.
• Globality has contributed to an ethnic revival in several countries
around the world by allowing substate nationalisms to state their
claims to a global audience.
• Global communication and mass migration have also contributed
to long-distance nationalism, whereby immigrants are able to
influence developments in their home countries, albeit without
having a physical presence in their country of origin.
• Globalization does not necessarily entail the displacement
of the nation as a key agent in global politics and as a
reference point for the cultural life of communities.
• This means that the relationship between nationalism and
globalization is one of mutual interdependence.
• Nationalism gains newfound strength from the use of the
global media and transnational trends, while globalization
reshapes national identities and makes them mobile and
free of the cage of territoriality.