Nationalism’s Opposing Meanings

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Introduction

The principle of nationalism remains complex due to various viewpoints, which have emerged to define it. This means that nationalism is not an easy discipline. We can attribute this complexity to different meanings people have attached to the concept of nationalism. Nationalism may present opposing views on a single subject. For instance, we may use nationalism as unifying or disintegrating factor.

This paper attempts to demonstrate moral transparency of nationalism due to its ability to accommodate two opposing views, for instance, evil and good. Significantly, the benchmark ideas most nationalists proclaim in order to advance their nations relate to justice or lack of justice.

Still, rights have other underlying moral claims to signify that rights themselves are not because of nationalism. From historical perspectives, we have to acknowledge that nationalism has never existed as a single and unadulterated idea. Instead, history shows that the term exists as a mixture alongside other concepts like conservatives, liberalism, and radicalism nationalism. Moreover, there are different types of nationalism, such as civic, ethnic, and cultural.

This essay maintains that interpretation and the manner nationalism relates with other factors and ideas are significant than its pure ideology. This analysis concurs with past studies, which indicate that nationalism is a post-modernity concept and socially constituted.

Function and Origin of Nationalism

Ernest Gellner was a prominent scholar in nationalism. He argues that economic transformation needs cultural uniformity. Gellner notes that nationalism emanates from the demand for cultural homogeneity and availability of state machinery to support it. In his view, Agrarian consists of overlapping factors like ethnic, linguistic, religious, political, and cultural factors.

The system established a chain of demands, for instance, industrialism needed uniformity of high cultures. This led to the demand for the education system. The education system created a state, which later demanded nationalism. This shows that state emanated from demands of industrial society. However, factors like economic interests, liberalism, and education could not create or shape a state on their own as Imagined Communities.

After Gellner in 1983, the first edition of Imagined Communities appeared. In this publication, Anderson referred to the constructed nature of culture and the role of print capitalism in nationalism. Anderson looked at cultural aspects and noted that pre-natural culture consisted of religious culture.

Nations emerged and took over their distinctive and constructed national cultures. Anderson puts much emphasis on the role of print capitalism. He noted that print capitalism established the foundation of new nations by developing systems of new national cultures.

The first Industrial Revolution led to the creation of new social, economic, and political thoughts. There were massive changes including market needs and the advent of the steam power. These demands led to developments in infrastructures that opened and increased urban networks.

These factors led to migration to urban centers. In cities, people demarcated their groups with differences in economic statuses. Industrialization transformed social structures of Western Europe as people began to define themselves with emerging technology and various ways of production.

This led to the rise of liberalism, nationalism, conservatism, and socialism ideologies. Class systems like proletariat, working class, and bourgeois emerged with different economic strengths. These social structures expressed diverse views on issues. For instance, bourgeoisie of Britain advocated for liberalism. This ideology promoted the idea of individualism and the recognition of individual rights.

They believed in constitutionalism and limited power of the government under a written constitution. However, liberals believed that property qualification was an appropriate tool of restricting the right to vote. In other words, only privileged property owners, businesspersons, and professionals could vote. Therefore, liberals represented the middle and upper classes and disregarded the lower class.

Nationalism and liberalism in Europe shared common factors. Nationalists wanted constitutional government and free of external control and tyranny. They expressed their ideas through art, literature, or music. Different nations approached nationalism by using various strategies. For instance, French preferred revolution as Germans expressed strong cultures to reflect national identity. In addition, Italy promoted national unity.

Germany also advocated for national unity, but the unification acted as conservative agenda. However, conservatives noted that change was inescapable. Thus, they compromised and assimilated some liberal ideologies. However, some conservatives like Klemens von Metternich maintained their support for traditional monarchy and political institutions.

Marx and Engels noted that the first Industrial Revolution also created socialist movement. According to Marx and Engel, socioeconomic structures like capitalism oppressed the working and lower classes. They argued for state-owned means of production and distribution. According to them, humankind history consisted of unending class struggle in which various classes replaced existing ones. For instance, Europe experienced three replacements, namely, kingly, aristocratic, and bourgeoisie.

After this, the working class shall takeover power. However, the process shall involve violence. Socialists’ main concern is the welfare of the entire society. We can conclude that the first Industrial Revolution led to new political ideologies. Thus, we can credit industrialization with the end of feudalism and aristocracy of the early Europe.

Revolutions across Europe, 1848-1850

In 1848, there was a widespread revolution in Europe because of political unrest, which resulted from rising food prices. This period also marked the increased demand for change by the working class. In addition, most ethnic communities of Europe started to fight for boundaries in order to reflect their ethnic uniformity.

The French Revolution of 1848 started as a struggle between the Parisian laborers and the Monarchy government. The Revolution attracted the National Guard, the militia, and a section of the army. The working class advocated for constitutional reforms across Austria and Prussia.

Revolutions of 1848 rocked political balance of Europe. However, these revolutions did not produce the desired results. Consequently, politicians used their newly acquired power to create powerful states.

France

Napoleon III assumed office in 1851 and 1852. These periods marked the start of dictatorship and emperor respectively. He created economic growth that led to increase in demands for French products. France established private banks, invested in railways, and rebuilt Paris.

The rebuilt center of the city only served the bourgeoisie. In this case, the poor only concentrated in city suburbs. France engaged in unsuccessful foreign missions. For instance, it declared war on Russia and supported Italian nationalists’ revolt against Austria. However, these activities had limited results, but they did not hurt the country.

Napoleon promoted a free-trade policy with the Great Britain and opened the Suez Canal. The French involvement in Mexico led to the failure of the emperor. The Franco-Prussian War led to the failure of the French army, which eventually led to the downfall of Napoleon Empire.

Germany

Otto von Bismarck aimed to preserve German unity. His approach involved realpolitik. Realpolitik ensured that the leader pursued national interests at all costs. Bismarck joined liberals and conservatives in a bid to secure a national unity. Bismarck opposed Austria as ambassador to the German Confederation between 1851 and 1859. Bismarck’s main aim was to build Prussia’s strength and unite the power of Prussia. Bismarck strategically aligned his agenda with the forces of German nationalism with the aim of removing Austria from affairs of Germany.

When Bismarck assumed office, his speeches created scandals and sensation. For instance, he declared that the government would work without parliamentary approval. He also attacked the middle-class opposition. Bismarck changed the outlook of the army as Prussians expressed their dissatisfaction by sending many liberals to the parliament between 1862 and 1866.

Bismarck defended conservative ideologies and noted that liberals were not hostile to the authoritarian government. Bismarck thought that the event of 1848 changed the country. Therefore, he believed that German middle-class would be better under a conservative government than uncertain quest for liberal government.

According to Bismarck, conservative government would propagate a national unity of Prussians. The liberal majorities blocked Bismarck’s constitutional reform. However, after Germany defeated Austria, Bismarck advocated for a federal constitution for the new North Germany.

All states maintained their local systems of government. Like Napoleon III, Bismarck reached for middle and working classes. This approach led to favor of Bismarck among the middle-class. By 1866, Bismarck had realized his dream of unified Germany and allowed many people to take part in the national development. Bismarck also earned respects from the middle-class.

The Franco-Prussian War and its aftermath

In 1870, the Franco-Prussia war broke out due to French resistance to Prussian control. The Southern Germany joined Prussia according to plans of Bismarck in order to avert threats from French. Consequently, this war favored Prussia and a new German empire emerged at Versailles with a liberal constitution.

However, the government was still responsive to the ruling elites and other professionals. The unification led to the creation of one national market, financial system, and integrated national economies. This led to rapid industrialization.

The war came with devastating consequences to France because it had to pay massive compensation and give up the rich eastern Alsace and parts of Lorraine in favor of Germany. Germany went ahead to claim Alsace and strengthened its military base. However, French believed that captures of Alsace and Lorraine were acts of aggression and crime. This marked the beginning of a poor relationship between Germany and France.

The Franco-Prussian War created a feeling of patriotism among Germans as other critics equated the war to Darwinian idea of struggle for existence. Germans claimed of Bismarck’s genius, solidified army, and unity of the nation both during and after the war.

Germans glowed with success and considered themselves as the best in Europe. The war partially created authoritarian regime and new conservatism. This was mainly a coalition of the wealthy class with the active support of the working majority. The war also influenced World War I. It demonstrated that small armies would not win any war in the future. Thus, it was imperative to borrow the German system and create a Nation in Arms as witnessed later in Europe.

The Changing Face of Nationalism

Many scholars linked the first wave of nationalism to liberalism in the first half of the century. Herder, Mazzini, and other theorists believed that many nations would survive under liberal-democratic ideologies (Mazzini 278). However, in 1860s and 1870s, nationalism took a different course as many nationalists supported national power and pride rather than supporting the entire community. Nationalism gradually lost its liberal ideologies.

There was a strong sense of competition among nations, which also influenced foreign relations. The US and Germany became exceptional examples among other nations of Europe after 1870. England was the dominant power of the world, and it expressed its concerns by looking for allies.

This led to the Dual Alliance of Austria and Prussia in 1879, and later the Triple Alliance as Italy joined them in 1882. This period marked the end of the Reinsurance Treaty between Germany and Russia as Russia forged a coalition with France between 1890 and 1894.

According to Bismarck, Germany had achieved its desires. Thus, it would not engage in wars in order to acquire many colonies. In this respect, Germany did not interfere with the power balance in Europe between 1871 and 1890. However, Bismarck assisted other nations to balance power as they destroyed of Ottoman Empire.

Britain and other states consider Germany as a menace. This is because the country was difficult to predict because of militarism and expansionism. Still, Germany also had constant fears from its neighbor due to its geographical position.

The beginning of 20th century marked a period of enhanced anarchy. This was not the case when nationalism only rotated around kings and other institutions. In this period, there were few wars. However, in 19th century, the idea of nationalism changed its course as nationalism identified nations with people. Nationalism resulted into nations against nations involving all citizens as Mishkova indicated (Mishkova 103).

Before World War I, nations were so aggressive to the extent of considering a major war in any slightest provocation. In 19th century, rapid industrialization resulted into other problems like unfavorable working conditions, increased poverty, and displacement. Technology advancements also determined the nation’s ability to adapt to changes. This marked the movement against materialism, rationalism, positivism bourgeois society, and liberal democracy as Melancon and Swanson indicate (Melancon and Swanson 376).

Fin de siècle referred to a European-wide cultural movement. It showed that civilization and history were progressive in nature. The past was under constant attack. Right-wing politics emerged that encouraged tradition amidst quest for change and calls for radical social change. The situations created cultural pessimism and social tension in Europe (Weber 278).

Social Darwinism encouraged a proactive racial thought. We had racial sciences to establish biological links in generations as a form of verifying national identity. This changed nationalism from its liberal ideologies. In other words, it set the pace for racial discrimination leading to divisive scientific theory of eugenics.

The idea was to show that mixed race was a recipe for chaos. Racial hygiene reflected the idea of public health tied to heredity. However, nationalists created new nations in which unity of the state accommodated ethnic and regional differences. In addition, force was acceptable form diplomacy. This made violence and nationalism parts of modern nations.

Conclusion

This essay shows the two opposing meanings of nationalism. It shows various aspects of nationalism across many centuries in Europe and its connection with the political ideologies and democratization.

The paper captures significant elements of in history of Europe related to nationalism. These include liberalism, modernism, society, culture, ethnicity, individualism and nationalist, and the relationship between Europe and the rest of the world. In all, it shows that nationalism is not static, but changes with periods of history, attitude, and ideologies of the time.

Works Cited

Mazzini, Giuseppe. The Duties of Man and Other Essays. Lawrence, KS: Neeland Media, 2007. Print.

Melancon, Michael and John Swanson. Nineteenth Century Europe: Sources and Perspectives from History. New York: Pearson, 2007. Print.

Mishkova, Diana. “The Nation as Zadruga: Remapping Nation-Building in Nineteenth Century Southeast Europe.” Disrupting and Reshaping. Early Stages of Nation- Building in the Balkans. Ed. Franzinetti, Guido and Marco Dogo. Ravenna: Longo Editore, 2002. 103-115. Print.

Weber, Eugen. Peasants into Frenchmen: The Modernization of Rural France, 1870- 1914. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1976. Print.

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