Nationalism - Terror or Independence?

P.A.N. – Pagans Against Nationalism

I just joined the abovementioned MySpace group. Before I had officially joined I wanted to do some further research on what nationalism is and how it can affect our world, our countries, our communities and our lives.

According to the P.A.N. group, the very definition of Pan – everything – is a symbol for freedom, wild natural power - nature itself. People expelled him because of his different nature. He frightened them because he did not fit in with the rest of the group. PAN is a symbol of tolerance and fights against exclusion.

What is Nationalism?

Not to be confused with patriotism, where one loves and defends the ideals of her/his country, nationalism is an attitude that can spread like a disease throughout a country.

While patriotism denotes positive and supportive attitudes to a country by individuals and groups, nationalism holds that a nation—usually defined in terms of ethnicity or culture—has the right to constitute an independent or autonomous political community based on a shared history and common destiny. Neutrally, this could be a good or bad thing.

But extreme forms of nationalism, such as those propagated by fascist movements in the twentieth century, hold that nationality is the most important aspect of one's identity while some of them have attempted to define the nation in terms of race or genetics. [Thank you Wikipedia for the concise definitions].

This is where nationalism gets scary, and has proven to be deadly. The following is a smattering of information that I have researched regarding nationalism. I have included a few examples of nationalism, links to full articles, and suggested reading material.

The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy puts “nationalism” up for debate.

“The term “nationalism” is generally used to describe two phenomena: (1) the attitude that the members of a nation have when they care about their national identity and (2) the actions that the members of a nation take when seeking to achieve (or sustain) self-determination. (1) raises questions about the concept of nation (or national identity), which is often defined in terms of common origin, ethnicity, or cultural ties, and while an individual’s membership in a nation is often regarded as involuntary, it is sometimes regarded as voluntary. (2) raises questions about whether self-determination must be understood as involving having full statehood with complete authority over domestic and international affairs, or whether something less is required.

“It is traditional, therefore, to distinguish nations from states — whereas a nation often consists of an ethnic or cultural community, a state is a political entity with a high degree of sovereignty. While many states are nations in some sense, there are many nations which are not fully sovereign states. As an example, the Native American Iroquois constitute a nation but not a state, since they do not possess the requisite political authority over their internal or external affairs. If the members of the Iroquois nation were to strive to form a sovereign state in the effort to preserve their identity as a people, they would be exhibiting a state-focused nationalism.

“Nationalism has long been ignored as a topic in political philosophy, written off as a relic from bygone times. It has only recently come into the focus of philosophical debate, partly in consequence of rather spectacular and troubling nationalist clashes, like those in Rwanda, the former Yugoslavia and the former Soviet republics. The surge of nationalism usually presents a morally ambivalent and for this reason often fascinating picture. “National awakenings” and struggles for political independence are often both heroic and inhumanly cruel; the formation of a recognizably national state often responds to deep popular sentiment, but can and does sometimes bring in its wake inhuman consequences, including violent expulsion and “cleansing” of non-nationals, all the way to organized mass murder. The moral debate on nationalism reflects a deep moral tension between solidarity with oppressed national groups on the one hand and repulsion in the face of crimes perpetrated in the name of nationalism on the other. Moreover, the issue of nationalism points to a wider domain of problems having to do with the treatment of ethnic and cultural differences within a democratic polity, which are arguably among the most pressing problems of contemporary political theory.

“In recent years the focus of the debate about nationalism has shifted towards issues in international justice, probably in response to changes on the international scene: bloody nationalist wars such as those in the former Yugoslavia have become less conspicuous, whereas the issues of terrorism, of “clash of civilizations” and of hegemony in the international order have come to occupy public attention. One important link with earlier debates is provided by the contrast between views of international justice based on the predominance of sovereign nation-states and more cosmopolitan views, that either insist upon limiting national sovereignty, or even envisage its disappearance.

One very well-known example of nationalism extremism is the former Nazi Germany of the 1940’s. Unfortunately, we have not learned from our mistakes. See: Rwanda

To learn more about nationalism, see the full debate here: http://www.science.uva.nl/~seop/entries/nationalism/

A brief look at nationalism horrors repeating themselves (April 2004), by blogger Ron Rapp of House of Rapp:

Rwanda: Have We Learned Nothing?

http://www.rapp.org/archives/2004/04/rwanda_have_we_learned_nothing/

“Mention the word ‘genocide’ or make reference to the systematic murder of millions and most people in the Western world will immediately think of the Holocaust. But that dark period represents only one of three such events to occur in the last century.

“During World War I, the forces of nationalism within the faltering Ottoman Empire lead to the 20th century’s first large scale genocide. Between 1915 and 1916, the Turks used the war as a pretense for “removing” all Armenians from Turkey. More than 1.5 million were murdered.

“The world must have collectively learned very little from this bloody bit of history, because just two decades later the Germans were crafting their ‘Final Solution’. Add six million to the tally there [my note: actually, it was 12 million people killed altogether. Six million Jews and six million others who did not fit in with Nazi Germany’s nationalistic ideals.].

“[Nazi] German efficiency being what it [was], you’d expect no one could kill people faster. Especially not on a continent where the weapons of choice [were] clubs and knives [my note: the Nazi’s worst weapons of all included hate, intolerance and nationalistic fear]. But ten years ago [from the date of this article] — April 7, 1994, the Hutu tribe in Rwanda began the mass murder of their Tutsi countrymen by the most primative means possible. Often with nothing more than their bare hands.

“[In Rwanda] more than 937,000 people were killed in just three months. That’s 10,411 people per day. 434 corpses every minute. Seven deaths per second. Every single second. Around-the-clock. For three months.”

On Saving Darfur:

Darfur and the Politics of Race: Understanding the Save Darfur Coalition

“The Save Darfur campaigns are better understood by looking at the post-September 11 US political scene. Unlike other “hot spots” across Africa, the Darfur tragedy reverberates deeply in the US because it is represented as a racial conflict between “Arabs” and “indigenous Africans,” and because the Darfur crisis offers a unique opportunity to unite against the new post-Cold War enemy. While some involved in the campaigns have been seeking genuine ways to support Darfurians—opportunists have racialized the conflict in order to divide Arabs and Africans by playing on historic and manufactured (colonial) divisions in Sudan...”

“When Sudan gained independence, the state builders in Khartoum embraced an Arab nationalism based on “a genealogy that stretched into the Islamic Arab past” and attempted to impose an Arab identity—and later Islamic law—not only on the north, but also on the southern territories. In consolidating the Sudanese state, the leadership would use a racial language that dated back to the seventeenth century, but they also adopted the racial categories and idea of “indigeneity” introduced by the British. Yet although many in the north self-identify as Arab and claim descent from noble Arabians who supposedly immigrated to Africa, that does not make them non-indigenous.

“The “Arab” versus “indigenous African” dichotomy runs through most discussions of the Darfur conflict…”

Read the full story here: http://www.leftturn.org/?q=node/769

And finally, concerning Kosovo’s newly emancipated state as of February 17, 2008, here is a very current example of nationalism:

Kosovo and the Perils of Nationalism – The New Republic: To Live In Peace, Newly Independent State Must Heed History's Lessons (CBS News, Feb 20, 2008)

“Kosovo's leaders - along with their European and American supporters - should not forget the lesson behind the tragedy that led to the Serbian province's declaration of independence this week. That lesson has much more to do with the horrors of nationalism as a power-hungry ideology than with the evils, real or perceived, of the Serbs.

“If the Kosovars end up replacing one form of nationalism with another, the recent declaration of independence will prove to be a betrayal of the wishes of ordinary Kosovars who aspire to be free and live in peace with themselves and the rest of Europe.”

Read the full story here: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/02/20/opinion/main3851457.shtml?source=RSSattr=Opinion_3851457

Books about nationalism:

Guibernau, M. and J. Hutchinson (eds.) (2001) Understanding Nationalism

http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Nationalism-Montserrat-Guibernau/dp/0745624022

McCrone, D. (1998) Sociology of Nationalism

http://www.amazon.com/Sociology-Nationalism-International-Library/dp/0415114608/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203877995&sr=1-1

Ozkirimli, U. (2005) Contemporary Debates on Nationalism

http://www.amazon.com/Contemporary-Debates-Nationalism-Critical-Engagement/dp/0333947738/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203878061&sr=1-1