Nationalism
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TYPES OF NATIONALISM Political nationalism is a highly complex phenomenon, being characterized more by ambiguity and contradictions than by a single set of values and goals. For example, nationalism has been both liberating and oppressive: it has brought about self- government and freedom, and it has led to conquest and subjugation. Nationalism has been both progressive and regressive: it has looked to a future of national independence or national greatness, and it has celebrated past national glories and entrenched established identities. Nationalism has also been both rational and irrational: it has appealed to principled beliefs, such as national self-determination, and it has bred from non-rational drives and emotions, including ancient fears and hatreds. This ideological shapelessness is a product of a number of factors. Nationalism has emerged in very different historical contexts, been shaped by contrasting cultural inheritances, and it has been used to advance a wide variety of political causes and aspirations. However, it also reflects the capacity of nationalism to fuse with and absorb other political doctrines and ideas, thereby creating a series of rival nationalist traditions. The most significant of
these traditions are: z z liberal nationalism
z z conservative nationalism z z expansionist nationalism z z anti-colonial and postcolonial nationalism.
Liberal nationalism Liberal nationalism is the oldest formof nationalism, dating back to the French Revolution and embodying many of its values. Its ideas spread quickly through much of Europe and were expressed most clearly by Giuseppe Mazzini, often thought of as the ‘prophet’ of Italian unification. They also influenced the remarkable exploits of Simon Bolivar, who led the Latin American independence movement in the early nineteenth century and expelled the Spanish from much of Hispanic America. US President Woodrow Wilson’s ‘Fourteen Points’, proposed as the basis for the reconstruction of Europe after World War I, were also based on liberal nationalist principles. Moreover, many twentieth-century anti-colonial leaders were inspired by liberal ideas, as in the case of Sun Yat-Sen (1866– 1925), one of the leaders of China’s 1911 Revolution, and Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964), the first prime minister of India.
KEY FIGURE
GUISEPPE MAZZINI (1805–72) An Italian nationalist, often portrayed as the ‘prophet’ of Italian unification. Mazzini practised a form of liberal nationalism that fused a belief in the nation as a distinctive language and cultural community with the principles of liberal republicanism. In this view, nations are effectively sublimated individuals endowed with the right to self-government, a right to which all nations are equally entitled. Mazzini was also one of the earliest thinkers to link nationalism to the prospect of perpetual peace.
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