Theories of Nationalism & Ethnicity

Theoretical Debates What is an ethnic group and a nation? Why do ethnic groups and nations exist? When did ethnic groups and nations appear?

Why Did the Ethnic Group Arise?   Instrumentalist Ethno-Symbolist Primordialist Key segment of group Elites, ruling class Romantic Intellectuals, Masses Entire Community or Social Organism Motives Behind Ethnic Groups Elite Wealth, Power, Status Meaning, Security, Belonging + instrumental motives Instinctive Kinship, Maximization of Group Fitness Source of Ethnogenesis Elites in competition with each other Intellectual-driven historicism and consciousness-raising, Warfare, culture contact Evolutionary struggle in prehistory Ethnic Groups Origin Modern period (post-1789) In History (after 6000 BC) Pre-History Process of Ethnogenesis Invention of the modern state or competing sub-state elites, who determine people's identities from above Created by intellectuals (religious or secular-romantic), but informed by traditional culture and mediated by popular sentiment Emerged organically as peoples met through migration and war Why Did the Ethnic Group Arise? Why Did the Ethnic Group Arise?

When Did the Ethnic Group Arise?   Modernist Perennialist Primordialist Ethnic Groups Origin Modern period (post-1789) In History (after 6000 BC) Pre-History Pre-Modern Social Structure Cosmopolitan Elite strata, localized masses (i.e. no imagined &/or integrated communities of territory and genealogy) Great difference: some vertically-integrated ethnic groups, some more loosely integrated units, some un-integrated, Groups rise and fall Ethnic groups ever-present throughout history, in all times and places Process of Ethnogenesis Invention of the modern state or competing sub-state elites Created by intellectuals (religious or secular-romantic), but informed by traditional culture and mediated by popular sentiment Emerged organically as peoples met through migration and war Major Theorists Ernest Gellner, Benedict Anderson, Eric Hobsbawm, Anthony Giddens Anthony Smith, John Armstrong, Walker Connor, Adrian Hastings Pierre van den Berghe, Joshua Fishman, Stephen Grosby

Primordialism – Pierre Van den Berghe Collective nepotism – or cooperation Relatedness ‘read’ off cultural markers Evolutionary success of ethnic cooperation

Ethno-Symbolism – Anthony Smith Social facts, moving through history 'Essentials' of culture and lifestyle DO shape self-understandings and constrain invention Culture as a motivating force

Instrumentalism - Eric Hobsbawm State and national political elites create ethnic groups to divide working class or otherwise advance their own claims for wealth, power, status. Motives are not biological or cultural, but political and economic. Nations were created after 1780

Modernism – Ernest Gellner Nations created in modern period, post-1789 Prior to 1789- local id, local genealogy, religious/imperial conception, no territorial self-conception

Modernism – Ernest Gellner culture played a stratifying role for elites, no vertical integration Kingdom, principality, empire means of keeping a small elite living off producers elite literacy in international modes

Modernism – Anthony Giddens Nation is a ‘Power-container’ created by the state Nations were created in the modern period through state systems

Perennialism – Adrian Hastings Nations have a much longer history than even Smith allows England in the time of Bede was already a nation Religion and vernacular languages helped create national identity

Perennialism – Anthony Smith Nations Created on the Basis of Pre-Modern Ethnic Groups Romantic Intellectuals, not the ‘Ruling Class’ were key

Perennialism vs. Modernism Modernists argue that: There is a lack of record of popular sentiment There is a record of discord within ethnies: China, North America, Italy, Georgia We see the rise and fall of groups, the change of peoples' names over time in particular area There is elite competition within groups

Perennialism vs. Modernism Perennialists argue that:   reference to others (natio, ethnos, gens) since antiquity elite writings mention ethnie, nation, from classical, biblical times language vernaculars spread early in Europe regna, myths focused on common customs and myths of descent military clashes could involve whole communities: zulu, mongol, norman, isrealites, swiss regional variants of class strata cultures (orthodox, latin, muslim) existed

Genealogy or Politics? Europe in the 9th Century