Nationalism, Ethnic Identity, and the Politics of Ethnic Violence

Introduction: The Persistence of National Identity

Nationalist identities are as hard to break as if they were ancient. At first, one might assume that, because nationality is an artificially constructed and imagined community based on tenuous social ties, it can be dissolved once those social ties are proved false or obsolete. However, the task of dissolving a national identity is completely different from the task of forming one. Identifying the methods and patterns through which nations are created does not necessarily explain how they can be dismantled.

The endurance of national qualities cannot be fully explained by examining political or historical trends alone, but only by understanding the individual. National identities persist because people simply refuse to relinquish them — either because the identity is deeply embedded in them, because they are heavily invested in it, or because there are no viable alternatives.

With over 195 nation-states in the world, many of which are failed states or are undergoing intense ethnic conflicts, it is natural to question the rationality of the nation-state. If nation-states were organized naturally or rationally, there would not be so much ethnic conflict and disunity within states. There is a growing recognition that individuals and their communities remain steadfast in their national or ethnic attachments, and especially that national loyalties can be nearly as fixed and durable as heritable traits. A variety of scholars, including political scientists, sociologists, and psychologists, have claimed that "national identity is perpetually malleable and there are an array of mechanisms through which national loyalties can be built and broken."

Background: Nation-States, Durable Loyalties, and Security Dilemmas

Keith Darden argues that the national loyalties instilled in a population during the introduction of mass schooling — when a community shifts from an oral to a literate mass culture — are internalized by individuals and their families through unique changes of status and culture, producing a powerful affective tie. Once initially established through the schools, national identities are preserved and reproduced over time within families and reinforced by local communities in a way that makes these constructed identities virtually impervious to significant change or elimination.

Michael Hechter argues that it was the pluralistic rule of pre-modern states, including empires, that suppressed the ascendancy of nations to exclusive political control of whole states. In the pre-modern state, indirect rule thwarted nationalism because it tolerated cultural heterogeneity as a means of governance. Empires imply that one state rules many others; there was no expectation that one should be ruled by a sovereign who shared one's ethnicity, culture, or language.

According to Barry Posen, the question is not whether ethnic identities endure but how ethnic groups survive while under constant threat. Many ethnic groups, like states, fear for their survival, and this fear is allayed only by the presence of a strong state. Where there is no strong state to ensure security, a security dilemma emerges. During a security dilemma, ethnic groups fearing for their safety take mutual defensive measures which, unchecked by outside powers, eventually spiral into war.

Posen describes the process in the modern era: "When traditional sovereigns disappear, they leave in their wake a host of groups — ethnic, religious, cultural — of greater or lesser cohesion. These groups must pay attention to the first thing that states have historically addressed — the problem of security — even though many of these groups still lack many of the attributes of statehood."

Posen uses the example of Serbs and Croats, who carry a terrifying oral history of each other's behavior yet have only existed as distinct national communities for approximately 125 years. The Hungarian divide-and-conquer strategy pitted Serbs and Croats against each other, and Serbia eventually emerged as a nation-state out of the Ottoman Empire in 1878. The Serbian nation-state perceived itself as representing all South Slavs, but Croats believed they were separate and preferred a confederacy of South Slavic states.

This is contrasted with Russia and Ukraine emerging from the fall of the Soviet Union but with a much less terrifying shared history. Ukrainian nationalists assert that Russia, through the Soviet Union, extracted substantial economic resources from Ukraine, while ignoring that the Soviet Union also invested heavily in Ukraine.

The creation of nationalist identities is very subtle but surprisingly deep. Once created, a nation cannot easily be broken — unless it fractures into smaller sub-nationalities. Nations are formed to allow one group of people to acquire some type of power for themselves, whether territorial, political, or symbolic (to distinguish themselves from another group). The criteria for nationhood are innumerable: language, history, culture, religion, geography, and more. Scholars have not been able to settle on a common definition because, in all likelihood, none exists. Almost any group is coherent enough for a "cultural entrepreneur" to organize into a political unit. When that political unit acquires enough power in the right circumstances, it can become a nation.

Why National Identities Endure

Nationalist identities are hard to alter because they are so deeply entrenched, having been formed during the most formative years of a person's development. Like any deeply ingrained habit or personality trait, a national identity becomes an essential instrument through which a person copes with the world. If a group of people prosper and struggle together long enough, they will inevitably form a bond — a feeling of common interest and shared humanity. Because most people are rather inarticulate in explaining why they feel a sense of togetherness with someone, they adopt clear labels that can be easily understood and recognized by others.

When a nationality is embedded, it is almost impossible for a person to truly abandon that identity. Some of this has to do with ego — nothing that is fundamentally "you" can feel inauthentic or malignant. Abandoning a national identity would be like choosing to leave one's family or, for some, ceasing to support a sports team one has followed throughout one's life.

Nationalist identities are also hard to alter because, by the time people recognize the hollowness of a national identity, they are too invested in it to let it go. There is usually little incentive to relinquish membership in a nation and many disincentives to do so. One could lose friends, family, home, or social position by relinquishing one's national identity.

Nationalist identities endure — and even multiply — because there are no viable alternatives in a world dominated by nation-states. Very few people choose to become stateless. For many, as Posen's study of Serbs and Croats illustrates, the nation is perceived as the only means by which a group of people can survive.

Nationhood is such a slippery concept that a satisfactory consensus regarding its creation remains elusive. It is possible that nations will always exist as long as conflict exists. However, perhaps we do not need to fully understand nationhood in order to contain its worst effects.

Conclusion

The Pax Americana has been largely successful in preventing the destructive total wars that marked the first half of the twentieth century. That success rests on the rational understanding of economics and power: states will damage their economies by going to war with one another, and a powerful hegemon in the United States polices the international system, ready to punish aggressive power plays. Scholars have shown that rationality plays a larger role in ethnic violence than previously believed. Perhaps ethnic violence remains partially exempt from the Pax Americana because it has not yet been sanctioned and punished emphatically enough. If warmongering leaders seriously believed that aggression would invite certain punishment from the international community, might ethnic violence be prevented?