Nationalism

Definitions of nationalism

nationalism it is the feeling of sharp attachment to the nation, i.e. of a large exaltation of the national idea; it is also political doctrines which affirm the primacy of the national interest, on the private interests of its components on the one hand and on the interests of the other nations on the other hand.
nationalism it is the will of people, of a common identity, to have a national territory.
nationalism can be an ideology printed on people by his controlling and intended to consolidate their capacity, it is then used like a means of handling in order to link the people around these leaders, independently of the real objectives of these individuals. (wars, totalitarist).
nationalism is doctrines which assert for a nationality the right to form a nation.

Ambiguïtées related to “nationalisms”

The " should be distinguished; nationalisme" resulting from real frustration from a threatened national identity feeling and political recovery " nationaliste" some could use or misuse; with an aim of personal political ambitions. Nationalism with the native direction cannot be a company warmonger.

“Nationalism” is an ambiguous term when it is not defined. He always intends to defend a National identity, justified by a historical and cultural community, vis-a-vis an external, real or supposed aggression. He seems to need to designate a “enemy” to exist.

He sometimes could be expressed against a “interior enemy” or a scapegoat, often foreign: the French Nationalisme under Pétain was Antisémite, under De Gaulle antiaméricain, today it is Anticommunautariste and generally antieuropéen.

According to the same paradigm, a “European Nationalism”, combatant the idea of nation, transposes the characteristics from there on an supra-official level for glorifier the “people European”. It has as enemies the State-nations, associated with the idea of war; European nationalism finds sometimes an enemy (in particular in France) in the the United States, system to be fought by imitating it (political competition, freedom of circulation of the capital, goods and services). European nationalism, or Européisme, is not uniform: it is in general the transposition of the national ideas according to the countries: Europe-power in France (the great French nation at community level), thefederal one in Germany (reproduction of European Bund), liberal Europe for the Atlantic countries.

Regional nationalists (they are not only!) denounce the “Centralisme Jacobin”, which led to a homogenization and a cultural and linguistic eradication imposed on different Minorité S integrated from force in the French population.

The partisans of a French Republic “one and indivisible” underline on the contrary the beneficial effects of state education and the social advancement and deny crushing and the eradication of different cultures.

The souverainists and the republicans fear as for them a conjunction of regional nationalisms and European state control.

Several types of “nationalisms”

One generally considers the existence of several types of nationalism:

the traditional , founded nationalism around idea of historical State-Nations like the France, the England or the Spain in Europe.
a nationalism oppressor, or Impérialisme, denying either the existence of the oppressed nation, or the existence of its national rights to the Self-determination, right recognized by UNO.
a nationalism liberator, or Indépendantisme, whose main concern is the national release, often vis-a-vis an occupant and who was particularly used during the Décolonisation.
the Regionalism or nationalism of the “people without States”, like the Corsica S, Breton S, the Occitans, the Basques, Galician or Catalan , which claims autonomy, even political and administrative independence;
the Separatism or nationalism of the people whose States are not sovereign, like the Québécois, the Écossais, the Porto Rican which claim a greater level of political autonomy;
finally the European Nationalism in particular defended by the school of thought “New right-hand side” near to the Extreme right-hand side.

Two principal ideological currents

One in general finds two principal currents ideological with nationalism:

the current of the “revolutionary Nationalism” of coloring atheistic, and sometimes even néo-pagan, preaching a European Nationalism diffused in particular by the current New right-hand side. For this tendency the Christianisme does not form part of the clean identity of the continent of Europe, being opposed to the pagan traditions.
the current of the “Nationalism counter-revolutionary” referring to the Christianity, the Monarchism, and the traditional nationalism (which designs France like a State-Nation since the kings Capétiens). Catholicism then has a place privileged in the identity of the French nation. This nationalism often refers to the “Chrétienté”. The French Nationalisme traditional results from this.

Nationalism in the history

Antiquity

As of Antiquity, there exists a feeling of membership common to political entities or morals.

One can quote in example:

; * The feeling of membership in the Greek world in opposition to the " barbares" (which does not speak the Greek language) and the mobilization of part of the Greek cities against the Persian invader. The other part of the Greek cities fought with dimensions Persians ; * The alliance of many Gallic people against the Romans and their allies, which counted Gallic people, during the Guerre of Gaules ; * Concept of Compatriote used by the Breton islanders during the wars against the Angles and the Saxons from which the names result from the Cambrie, Cumberland, Northumbrie and the name that themselves the Welsh (" are given; Kymry") : All these names come from a Celtic root designating the compatriots

These examples refer to entities morals and not to nations with the modern direction.

The Middle Ages

The beginning of the modern design of the Nation can be dated from the victory of the Dukes of Anjou of the Dynastie of Valois in the Guerre One hundred Year old over that of the dukes of Normandy and Guyenne represented by the King of England. The assertion of the French nation and its language by the descendants of the Dolphin of Chinon, with the Ordonnance of Villers-Cotterêts are the nodal points of the foundation of the modern French nation. The French nation is affirmed by the dynasty of the winners to consolidate his victory and to move away any hope from revenge by raising and centralizing the royal capacity. The ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts imposes the language of the winners (the language of Touraine and the countries of the Loire). This beautiful regional language becomes the " language nationale" and will be used like a tool of being able and domination of the satellite people (Language of Oc, and combined potential of King d' Angleterre, Brittany in the Flanders). It is the beginning of walk towards the royal absolutism, then later the centralism Jacobin. The current French nationalists were not mistaken there while taking for icon, Jeanne d' Arc, who symbolizes this victory of Valois.

Modern nationalism in Europe

In France

In Italy

In Germany

Birth of German nationalism

But it is in Prussia that is born a national German feeling. Beaten by Napoleon i, Prussia is weakened and seeks to be raised. She thinks that a union must be made between the people of the German territory to fight against the common enemy: Napoleon. Nationalism is current of idea which affirms the superiority of the nation in the construction of the States. Stein, Prussian minister of state of 1804 with 1808 and Hardenberg, Foreign Minister of 1804 with 1806, reform the Prussian State Scharnhorst and Prussian Gneisenau, general and marshal, reorganizes the Prussian army of 1807 with 1813 and animate it of a sacrifice to the common national hello.

It is around Prussia that the German patriots in this patriotic war and main road gather which one very quickly calls the wars of liberation ( Befreiungskriege ). Appear then a whole series of make out and of texts claiming the constitution of a German State grouping all the people speaking the German language, including with the need for the people apart from what was until in 1806 the Saint Worsens. Thus develops the Volkstum , gathering of all the of the same men language, of the same culture.

In the Austro-Hungarian Empire

The identity binationale in Austria-Hungary form a typical location for this State, Worsens central in Europe.

The 19th century sees the birth or the assertion of nationalist feelings within the various people gathered under the authority of the Empire Austro-Hungarian. It is the prelude to the dissolution of this empire at the conclusion of the 1st world war.

In the Ottoman Empire

In the United Kingdom

See also: Irish Nationalism, Welsh Nationalism, Scottish Nationalism

The Irish nationalists organize themselves and will create in 1905 Sinnfein and WILL SUIT it (parts asserting independence, WILL SUIT it will use violence to be made known…). During the First World War, the Irishmen will revolt and repression will be wild!

Though the national ideologies of Wales and Scotland did not reach the above mentioned degree of violence, these two other nations forming the multinational State of Great Britain also developed nationalisms; that of Scotland fails in 1930, where it will succeed in 1997 concerning autonomic sovereignty, while reforming itself considerably (the face of contemporary Scottish nationalism is quite different from the Années 1930).

Synthesis

The development of the idea of Nation and thus of nationalism is indissociable development of the modern State. Nationalism is based on variable identities.

Two great types of nationalism can be defined:

a nationalism of the type French, which associates the nation with its Territoire (right of the ground)
and a nationalism of the German type which associates the nation with a common origin (right of blood, lira Pangermanisme).

Nationalism cannot be completely analyzed according to a left typology - right, even if it is rather of right, and so in first half of the 20th century, it was at the origin of the fascistic movements and national-Socialists and in opposition to the Internationales successive Socialists. It can be opposed to the Supranationalisme vaster political entities.

In France, one indicates historically under this term, more particularly, a intellectual and political tendency of the beginnings of the Third Republic born after the defeat of 1870, especially at the origin in the radical mediums and which one will classify rather on the right at the end of the century. The nationalists wanted in the beginning to exceed ideological cleavages born of the Revolution and to seek to bring together the French around a History and of an identity being able to recreate a consensus in the objective of a revenge or a defense vis-a-vis the German ambitions, increasingly posted with the arrival of Guillaume II with the capacity.

Thus included/understood, French nationalism can be regarded as a general movement which embraces all the nonsocialist parties, of the conservatives to the radicals, sometimes in populist forms dangerously warmongers (boulangism) or being able to derive on conservatism (defense at all costs of the army and, less strongly, the Church), on xenophobia or the anti-semitism (obsession of the interior enemy especially in the Dreyfus Business).

The nationalism of doctrines or “extreme right-hand side” (still that it does not have great a deal to see at the origin with the lines legitimist, orleanist or preserving) appear in an autonomous way only at the time of the Dreyfus business and will have for principal figure Maurice Barrès, which had already given an opinion against the rationalist Neo-Kantianism and all German philosophies or not, very with the mode at the time in the French universities, in the name of the “fatherland and of deaths”, against the metaphysics abstractions without rejecting for as much the mode and the ideals of the Revolution. It is only the extreme point of a tendency whose as different people and sometimes keen adversaries will claim themselves as Poincaré, Jules Ferry, Emile Flourens, Boulanger, Paul Déroulède, Victor Hugo, Felix Faure or Clemenceau.

Other “nationalist” tendencies

To the 20th century, previously limited to the Europe and the the United States of America, nationalism extends in the countries from the South which dispute the assimilation of the nationalists of the North which led them to be colonized.

Separatisms

The purpose of certain nationalisms, nationalisms liberators or defensive, are stated to release a nation of the influence of another entity perceived like dominant. They are Séparatisme S. One can locate in this current:

much of leaders of old colonies like Gandhi, which was said explicitly nationalist,
the Irish Nationalisme, as much the policy, centered on release of the British yoke, which the cultural one aiming at restoring the culture Gaelic of the Irishmen
the Lebanese Nationalisme, the national block (Emile Eddé, Raymond Eddé), Wadih Fayad
the Scottish Nationalisme,
the Walloon Nationalisme,
the Corsican Nationalisme
the Breton Nationalisme
the Porto Rican Nationalisme
the Québécois Nationalisme, which is primarily a " movement which aims to the promotion of the membership of a given nation "
and a good part of the Flemish nationalists and thiois.

When the dominant entity is a State, one will speak, according to the degree of autonomy wished, regionalism, Autonomisme or Indépendantisme.

In Europe, when the perceived entity as dominant is a structure broader than a State (for example the European Union), one will speak rather about Souverainisme.

Imperialisms

The other main tendency in nationalism, dominating nationalism, definitely more conquering, aims to the domination by a nation of a territory definitely vaster than that which it occupies. One can in particular quote:

the Bonapartism
the IIIème Reich
the European colonialism;
the definition of a " Enemy hereditary " at ends of Propaganda.

Nationalism is in this case synonymous with Impérialisme (if the dominated entity is out of the State dominating) or of Jacobinisme (if the dominated entity forms integral part of the State dominating). This nationalism seeks sometimes justifications in a great history : dreams of re-establishment of the Roman Empire of Mussolini, theory of the Lebensraum (vital Space) of the Nazis, civilizing claims of colonialism, etc

A crucial distinction between these two basically different tendencies is the recognition or not of rights equal to the other people.

Many nationalist parties were gradually associated with the Extrême right-hand side although in the beginning nationalism is not dependant there (but will become it by an evolution seeming to take shape at the end of the 20th century). NSDAP wanted to be for example “national-Socialist”.

“Technological nationalism”

Maurice Charland characterized a “ technological nationalism ” like a tendency towards the construction and the legitimation of the State-nation by systems of Transport and Communication financed and sponsored by the public authorities. Harold Innis, theorist of the communication, starts a reflection on technological nationalism and the economic relation which links the urban Canada in rural Canada, ideas on which is based its Théorie of the main resources.

Oppositions to nationalism

the socialist parties of all the countries defended officially the Internationalisme, which is opposed to nationalism.

However, in France at least, the majority of the Socialists joined itself the warmongers in 1914, then clearly with colonialism after 1945.

In Germany, NSDAP was a drift, as its name indicates it, of the nationalist ideology, associated with an exacerbated populism that the leader themselves tried to connect with socialism, in the hope to increase its audience, in the popular layers, with depend on SPD (left social democrat) and, sometimes even, of KPD (German Communist party).

In practice also, the Stalinisme was shown sometimes nationalist, even racist or anti-semite.

In addition the federalistic Europeans are defined in opposition to nationalism, definite as being the belief in the idea of State-nation, seen like a factor of war.

Among the users of the language Esperanto, developed since 1921 an organization which names SAT (abbreviation in Esperanto of Sennacieca Asocio Tutmonda which means Worldwide association anationale), one of most important associations in the espérantophone medium. One of its principal founders, Eugene Lanti, pseudonym of Eugene Adam told him even anationalist. For him, the Anationalisme was opposed to the internationalism, which was in fact of internationalism and thus a form of nationalism. Today, if all the members of SAT are not anationalists, SAT has in its center a anationalist fraction.

One can quote in opposition to nationalism, the political Universalisme, cf the newspaper the universalist.

Quotations

the nation, it is the ground and deaths. For us, the fatherland, it is the ground and the ancestors, it is the ground of our deaths --> (Maurice Barrès)
the nation is what makes in the man the human one. (Jean-Paul II)
You can tear off the man of the country, but you cannot tear off the country of the heart of the man. (John Back Passos)
Because nationalism, it is not a put out of order will of power, quite to the contrary; it is the will to maintain and develop in a nation what is necessary to the usual life, with the common life. (Henri Massis),
the individual success and the national success are inseparable. (Jean-Pierre Chevènement)
nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of humanity. (Albert Einstein)
nationalism, it is the war! (François Mitterrand),
the nation, like the individual, is the bordering one of a long past of efforts, sacrifices and devotions. (Ernest Renan)
So necessary that is to say patriotism, far from making useless the virtue of nationalism, it caused it with life. (Charles Maurras),
All that is national is ours. (Duc of Orleans)
a democracy is not worth and lasts only if it can constantly redesign in the national community the individualism which it gives birth to. (Jacques de Lacretelle)
nationalism is an attitude of defense, made necessary by the weakness of the State. (Jacques Bainville)
the bolt which must jump, it is the nation. (Edmond de Rothschild)

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