Conservative Nationalism
Conservative nationalism is a political ideology that emphasizes preserving traditional values, cultural identity, and national sovereignty. It often advocates for strong borders, limited immigration, and a focus on national interests over global cooperation. Conservative nationalists typically prioritize national security and economic protectionism while promoting a sense of national pride and unity.
4 Key excerpts on "Conservative Nationalism"
eBook - ePubThe Conservative Party and the nation
Union, England and Europe
- Arthur Aughey(Author)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- Manchester University Press(Publisher)
...This understanding has been concerned not so much with the intensity of national feeling as with the source of national feeling. Conservatism locates true nationhood in the inherited practices of a way of life which it is the duty of the party, where possible, to sustain. If this is sometimes expressed in the language of nationalism, traditionally Conservative politics has been concerned either to limit or to channel nationalist sentiment. Though commenting on the United States, Harvey Mansfield Jr (1983) captures this objective well when he writes of institutions displacing the sovereign people with the constitutional people (which is more or less a theoretical gloss on Colls’ historical reading of the process in Britain). As the masses began to jostle the classes for their voice to be heard in politics, the Conservative conceit was that constitutional politics educated the many in the responsibilities of government, in particular in the need to exercise restraint in order to enjoy liberty. And for the few it had the inestimable value of helping to secure the rights of property. Nationalism, with its tendency to deny constitutional constraint in the name of the people, was considered to be just as potentially subversive of good government as any other species of radicalism – which is not to deny that there are elements of populism in Conservatism or that Conservative politics has avoided jingoism. There are; it has not; and this is normally justified as speaking to natural ‘prejudices’, or it is called ‘Tory democracy’, to use Randolph Churchill's term (Shannon 1992). For Conservatives (following Burke) prejudices are those pre-political affections, such as national belonging, upon which constitutional order depends, but is dangerous if it escapes the political discipline of Conservatism – which was the very problem with the UK Independence Party (UKIP)...
eBook - ePubPolitical Ideologies
An Introduction
- Robert Eccleshall, Vincent Geoghegan, Richard Jay, Michael Keeny, Ian MacKenzie, Richard Wilford, Vincent Geoghegan, Rick Wilford, Vincent Geoghegan, Rick Wilford(Authors)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...The fact that it can be allied to conservatism or to socialism might not be a weakness but a strength. According to Freeden, ideologies ‘enable meaningful political worlds to be constructed’ (1996: 749), and they do so by providing identifiable sets of meaning or ‘conceptual configurations’. Nationalism, he suggests, doesn’t provide such a unique constellation. It is composed of a ‘restricted core’ and a narrow range of political concepts. Often it is a component of other ideologies. But he adds two important points to the three elements identified by Kedourie: the first is that any particular nationalist ideology does not propose only that nations are central to human relationships but that a particular nation is particularly important; the second is that nationalism is always marked by strong emotions and attachment to history as a story about the continuous existence or persistence of a people, and to a territory understood as the place where that history has been, and should continue to be, played out (1996: 751–4). Nationalism as a broad claim about the naturalness of nations and their connection to political legitimacy doesn’t propose very much. But very few people – and no nationalist activists – propose only these broad claims. They propose the self-determination of a particular nation or people, and in so doing they specify things about that people: their history; the key events that shape and define them; their values, perhaps including their attitude towards property rights, the proper form of government, euthanasia, taxes and spending. It then becomes quite a substantive and extensive ideology, and one that is able to appeal to our emotions and sense of identity...
- Daniel Cetrà(Author)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- Palgrave Macmillan(Publisher)
...While classical liberals typically argue for the protection of basic individual rights and liberties, liberal nationalists counter that liberals cannot be indifferent to the survival of national cultures, given that they are not indifferent to ensuring the conditions for autonomous individual choice. Liberal nationalism may come in stronger and weaker forms. James Kennedy (2013) makes a distinction between two faces of liberal nationalism. On the one hand, ‘ Liberal nationalism ’, which results from a nationalisation of liberalism, emphasises individualism and seeks to reconcile the promotion of individual rights and group-specific rights. On the other hand, ‘ liberal Nationalism ’, which results from the liberalisation of nationalism, ultimately puts greater emphasis on the collective and group-specific rights. Fig. 2.1 Liberal nationalism in the liberal-communitarian debate Liberal nationalists typically argue that ‘it is a legitimate function of the state to protect and promote the national cultures and languages of the nations within its borders. This can be done by creating public institutions which operate in these national languages; using national symbols in public life (e.g. flag, anthem, public holidays); and allowing self-government for national groups on issues that are crucial to the reproduction of their language and culture (e.g. schemes of federalism or consociationalism to enable national minorities to exercise self-government)’ (Kymlicka 2001 : 39). Note that liberal nationalism calls for recognition and accommodation of both majority and minority national cultures and languages that fall within the boundaries of the state. In fact, Kymlicka and other liberal nationalists are quite sympathetic with majority nationalism. They object to the idea that the statewide majority should be able to impose its preferences throughout the state...
eBook - ePubNationalism and Post-Colonial Identity
Culture and Ideology in India and Egypt
- Anshuman A Mondal(Author)
- 2004(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...Consequently, the nation can be seen to be the product of nationalist ideology and not a pre-existing and objective cultural category waiting to assume the trappings of state. This point will be further discussed in greater detail, but for now one can widen the issue of terminology to incorporate another term that fluctuates wildly according to use, namely ‘nationalism’. Part of the problem for the culturalists is that even though the nation is, for them, conceived of as a ‘pre-political’ category, nevertheless, by accepting its ‘modernity’ (in that modern nations are not the same as pre-modern ethnies), and by accepting that an aspect of the ‘modern’ nation is, to a greater or lesser degree, a politicization of the cultural community, they cannot actually separate culture from politics much as they would like to in theory. Thus they cannot separate nations from nationalism. Nationalism, its nature and function, becomes a crucial question for all concerned. The culturalists, therefore, must engage the statists on this question and come up with a definition for nationalism. Smith defines nationalism as, ‘an ideological movement for the attainment and maintenance of self-government on behalf of a group some of whose members conceive it to constitute an actual or potential nation.’ 10 Given that nationalism, in this definition, must, in some sense, be spoken of in political terms it seems at first glance that nationalism is a much less contentious and problematic term than nation. However, Smith divides the category into two com- ponents, a principle or doctrine and a movement to realize this doctrine. Gellner, Smith’s opponent in the debate, also splits nationalism into these two categories, as does Breuilly. Yet given the structure of oppositions in the debate, it is at once clear that the definition of the ‘doctrine’ in turn must necessarily be qualified by the definition of the ‘nation’ that underlies it...
