Nationalism

A Short History

Liah Greenfeld

• Publisher: Brookings Institution Press
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9780815737025
• Topic: Política y relaciones internacionales
• Subtopic: Nacionalismo y patriotismo

Tracing the origins and reemergence of a phenomenon once thought vanquished by the modern, globalized world.

"We need a nation," declared a certain Phillippe Grouvelle in 1879, "and the Nation will be born."—from Nationalism: A Short History

Nationalism, once the scourge of world politics, is back. And for many today, Grouvelle's simple declaration is all that is needed to will a nation into being. But as historian Liah Greenfeld shows in her new book, a sense of nation, of nationalism, is the slow distillation of ideas and beliefs, and the struggles over them, not the product of a pronouncement.

Greenfeld takes the reader on an intellectual journey through the origins of the word "nationalism" and how it has changed over the centuries. From its emergence in sixteenth century England, nationalism has affected nearly every significant development in world affairs over succeeding centuries, including the American and French revolutions of the late eighteenth centuries and the authoritarian communism and fascism of the twentieth century. Now it has arrived as a mass phenomenon in China as well as gaining new life in the United States and much of Europe in the guise of populism.

Written by an authority on the subject, Nationalism: A Short History stresses the dichotomy of how nationalism has been institutionalized in various places. On the one hand, nationalism has contributed to the concepts of liberal democracy, human rights, and individual self-determination. But nationalism also has been used by authoritarian and racist regimes to negate the individual as an autonomous agent. That tension is all too apparent today.

INDEX

Académie des Sciences, 35–36

Afghanistan, Soviet invasion of, 113

Africa: monotheism in, 118; nationalism in, 113–14

Age of Nationalism, 49

Amendola, Giovanni, 108

Anarchists, 110–11

Anti-Semitism, 99, 102–03, 106–08, 112, 133

Aristotle, 4

Asia, nationalism in, 113–14, 133

Athens (ancient), 4–5

Austro-Hungarian Empire, 2

Authoritarian democracies, 86–88, 109, 111

Authority, delegating, 42–43

Autocracy, 66, 72–74, 125

Bible, 5, 19–20

Birth country, nationalism based on, 82–83. See also Collectivist/ethnic nationalism

Bolsheviks in Russia, 125

Brexit, 133–34

Britain. See England

Calvinism, 24

Capitalism, 23–25, 46, 102–04, 106, 127

Catherine II (empress of Russia), 69–72

Catherine of Aragon (queen of England), 20

Change as progress, 55

Charles V (Holy Roman emperor), 20

Charter on Liberty of the Nobility (Russia), 71–72

China and Chinese civilization: absorption of conquering civilizations, 117; capitalism in, 127; communism in, 125–26; cultural integrity of, 2; early regional dominance of, 119–20; elite of, 126–27; and globalization, 117–20, 124–29; Japanese relations, 124–25; monotheistic civilizations vs., 117–21; national consciousness of, 124–26; nationalism in, 125–29; Olympics (2008), 128

Christianity: ancient Rome, effect on, 117; and anti-Semitism, 99; and Bible, 5, 19–20; cultural continuity of, 115–16; on equality, 5–7; forced conversion of Jews and Pagans, 6, 65; Islam, conflict with, 119; and Japanese civilization, 121; predestination and profit from labor, 24; and Protestant Reformation, 19–21, 24; rivalry with and envy of Judaism, 75; social hierarchy within, 7–9; spread of, 117; tolerance of, 6–7

Church Council of Lyon (1274), 16

Civic nationalism. See Collectivist/civic nationalism; Individualistic/civic nationalism

Civilizations as cultural processes, 115–17

Classical learning, English vs. European mastery of, 30

Class struggle, 100, 105

Clement VII (pope), 20

Clergy, 7–8

Colbert, Jean-Baptiste, 35

Cold War, 88. See also Soviet Union

Collectivism, 103–04, 111

Collectivist/civic nationalism: and authoritarian...