Unit 1: Power, sovereignty and international relations

Defining states and nations

Syllabus objectives
Sovereignty is one of the 16 key concepts in Global
Politics.
It is particularly important as it is one of the four
concepts we can specifically link to the core unit of
GP- Power, Sovereignty and International Relations.
Although all concepts are connected to all areas of
GP, power, sovereignty, legitimacy and
interdependence are particularly related to the PSIR
unit which is considered the foundation for all IB
Global Politics.
To understand sovereignty, we first have to
consider definitions of the following:
-state
-nation
-nation state
-stateless nation
What is a state?
What is a state?
A state is the basic political units of communal
organisation in today’s world. In addition to states there are
other levels of communal organisation such as regions,
provinces, towns and supranational organisations.

States are responsible for structuring the lives of the people

that belong to that community which is usually defined by
territorial boundaries.
What is a nation?
What is a nation?
A nation can be defined in several ways. Usually a nation is
refer to as a large group of people who share a common
identity and constitute an "imagined community." (see next
slide)
The identity of the nation is usually grounded on a common
historical, ethnic, religious, or linguistic background.
Nations are complex phenomena and their boundaries more
difficult to define than those of states, because rather by
territorial criteria, they are shaped by a collection of cultural,
political and psychological factors.
 Anderson
In 1983, Benedict Anderson published a book
titled ‘Imagined Communities’. He defined nations as:

1. Imagined because members have mental image of their affinity

2. Limited, as nations have "finite, if elastic boundaries, beyond which lie other
nations“

3. Sovereign insofar as no monarchy can claim authority over them

4. Finally, a nation is an imagined community because "regardless of the actual

inequality and exploitation that may prevail in each, the nation is always
conceived as a deep, horizontal comradeship. Ultimately it is this fraternity that
makes it possible, over the past two centuries, for so many millions of people,
not so much to kill, as willingly to die for such limited imaginings.

This links to the theory of social constructivism!

What is a nation-state?
What is a nation-state?
A Nation-State is the idea of a homogenous nation governed
by its own sovereign state—where each state contains one
nation.

A "nation-state" would be a community in which the political

and territorial boundaries coincide with those of a single
cultural, ethnic, linguistic and / or historical nation.

This idea is almost never achieved. Two commonly cited

examples are Iceland and Japan.
What is a multi-nation
state?
What is a multi-nation state?
Definitions of a multi-nation state are strongly debated.
According to Alain Dieckhoff the term ‘multi-nation state’ is often
used to cover too wide a range of states. The reasoning behind this is
that if every state that contains more than one cultural or national
group were considered to be a multi-nation state, almost every
country would fall under this definition, thus robbing it of all meaning.

A multi-nation state is a state containing national plurality in a

particular form, where a national minority is only within the state
forming a kind of internal state.
For example, Quebec in Canada, Catalonia and Galicia in Spain etc.
Why are multi-nation states important for
you to know about?
Frequently civil and regional violence and conflict occurs
between communities that identify as different nations.
At the most extreme, this is genocide.
Consequently, peace processes (which you will study in
the Peace and Conflict unit) must often incorporate
power-sharing agreements and mechanisms to build
peace between different groups within a country. A
common debate in Peace Studies is whether such
agreements work or fail.
What is a stateless
nation?
What is a sateless nation?
What is the difference
between a micronation
and a microstate?
Micronations and microstates
A micronation is an entity that claims to be an independent
state but whose sovereignty is not recognized by the
international community.
Microstates, such as Liechtenstein or Vatican City, are
sovereign states with extremely small territories. They are
internationally recognized.
Micronations...
https://geographical.co.uk/places/item/3251-micronations
Re-cap:
Task: Creating flow diagrams
In groups, you will
create a flow diagram
to distinguish between:
-states
-nation states
-stateless nations
-multination states
-something else?
Task: Creating flow diagrams
You should test it buy running different entities through it:
-Antarctica
-Belgium When discussing this we must
acknowledge that most states and
-Catalonia nations are contested and that people
-European Union have different perspectives- often with
strong beliefs.
-India Thus, we must be sensitive in how we
-Japan approach conversations, and also how
we phrase our essay writing.
-Solomon Islands Violence often comes from precisely
-Taiwan these debates of sovereignty and
legitimacy.
-Taureg
-Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus
-UWC