The Global Decline of Nationalism

I am arguing that globally nationalism is on the decline. What?! I can already hear the loud screams of disbelief from everyone, especially anyone who has been following global politics for the last few years. I am sure there are those reading this is who are already thinking that I should get my head examined for even suggesting such a thing. Which rock have I been living under? What is colour of the sky in my world?

I wouldn’t blame anyone who thought that though. In fact, the consensus among popular pundits is that globally countries are becoming hyper-nationalist or ultra-nationalist and there has been a steady democratic decline over the last decade or so. There is some truth to the second half of that statement, that there has been a steady decline in faith in a liberal democracy with many authoritarian leaders gaining power in many parts of the democratic world. And many of these leaders often project themselves as nationalists or even very staunch nationalists. In fact, even their political detractors and journalists refer to them as nationalists, so the notion that world is going through a phase of ‘ultra-nationalism’ is almost universally accepted without question.

What is nationalism?

But if one actually put some thought into it, there has in fact been a significant decline is nationalism over the last decade or so. No. I am not trying to do any linguistic gymnastics to redefine nationalism nor conflating patriotism and nationalism. Patriotism is in-fact different from nationalism, but this not the difference I am trying to split here. Nor am trying explain away my idea as a difference between ‘civic nationalism’ vs ‘cultural or ethic nationalism’ whatever they mean.

Nationalism explained in the most simplistic and crudest form is a tribalistic attachment to one’s nation state or national identity, irrespective of the actions and ideals of one’s nation. There are many who criticize nationalism for exactly that reason that it is often a blind loyalty to one’s state. In more extreme cases fear, anger and hatred of an external enemy is used as a means of social cohesion by ‘nationalistic’ leaders to gain power within the country. In extreme forms of nationalism, this focus on ‘external enemy’ and the ‘danger they pose to the nation’ is a very important feature of nationalist feeling.

Over the last several decades in India, Pakistan has often been this boogeyman that’s been used to instill nationalism. (If anything, this is even more so on Pakistan’s side, almost as if the entire purpose of that nation’s existence is its insistence on opposition to India). In the US, over the decades, during the cold war, extreme form of nationalism resulted in the red scare and McCarthyism and more recently the ‘War on Terror’ found many enemies in Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran and North Africa and a lot of political power within America. It was US nationalism that led it to unleash an illegal war in Iraq and even though there were critics of the war within the US later, during the time, the invasion of Iraq had more than 70% approval within the US. Not just hot wars or trade wars, sometimes even humanitarian help and aid missions have often been roadblocked by nationalism. And typically, anyone who plays down the threat of this external enemy whether real or perceived is often derided as traitors.

Is nationalism always bad?

Since nationalism is a blind tribalistic attachment that can often lead to bad results, there are many who view nationalism as an intrinsically bad thing. Patriotism, which is a commitment to a nation’s values and ideals rather than nation itself or its symbols is viewed by some as a higher form of national pride.

However, nationalism not always bad. Nationalism can often lead to wonderful things, most notably recently, the spirited defense that Ukrainian President and people have put up in the last few days against Russian invasion. (Although to be fair, this is really a case of an external enemy trying to destroy their country).

Historian and Author Yuval Noah Harari in an interview to Hebrew University spoke about the bright side of nationalism which inspired me to think about this. Nationalism is just a story.. a story to achieve social cohesion and feeling oneness within a country or a region. Nationalism if used well has the power to bring together people of very diverse cultures together. If you have a story that brings together 95% of people in a region (well… nothing is 100% efficient), to cooperate and coexist with each other, looking past all their other differences, then you have successfully created a Nation!

In a vast sub-continent like India, nationalism helps to bring together people of different tribes, of different religions, languages, ethnicities etc. Nationalism can be a positive force that helps achieve a lot of great things, like eradication of polio. Nationalism can enable people to rise above their self and care for people who are little like themselves. We pay taxes that help pay for healthcare for people whom we have never met and we accept as leader people with whom we have no personal connection. Nationalism can be a very potent and positive force that brings people together.

Thing is, you can achieve this social cohesion based on positive emotions of hope and camaraderie between people or hack your way to political power by stoking fear and anger over an external enemy. The later does often lead to disastrous consequences.

Nationalism is declining

Now to the main argument of this article, that nationalism on the decline. Whether feelings of nationalism are fed by hope or by fear and anger, main feature of nationalism is a very strong social cohesion within the country. But this is actually not at all what we see in the world today. In all the examples that pundits give as examples of ‘hyper-nationalism’ are actually examples of crumbling nationalism and increasingly fragmented and polarized societies. Whether its America or India, the phenomenon we see is not that of hyper-nationalism, but breakdown of nationalism. Political rhetoric and narratives are not aimed at an external enemy internal. Most Indians who are politically active on either side of the divide, wake-up in the morning and their fear anger and hatred they feel are towards other Indians not external enemies. Political rhetoric and narratives try to achieve political consolidation of votes not by identifying external enemies but by identifying and highlighting enemies within the society. Media debates are often cast as ‘this side’ vs ‘that side’ (the sides being whether you support Mr. Modi or you don’t).

It’s the same phenomenon in the US as well, which is a deeply polarized country where the “two sides” cannot see eye to eye on anything. Trump being voted out to be replaced by Biden hasn’t changed that one bit. Though Biden had stated that his objective was to bring the country together, he simply doesn’t have the political capital or charisma to achieve that… to tell a story that’d bring that 95% of American together. (The reason why I am talking about US is because, I’ve lived there for few years and followed its politics.. besides its the oldest continuous running democratic experiment)

True, these polarizing regimes often appear nationalistic, because they appeal a lot to ‘national’ symbols and specifically invoke the Armed forces a lot in their rhetoric. But this does not necessarily indicate nationalism. In so far as National symbols like flags and anthems and institutions like Army are used, they are used to guilt trip the non-aligned population to fall in line and not necessarily intended to channel feelings against an external enemy and maximize social cohesion internally.

The overarching conclusion is that stories and narratives that bound a vast majority of very different people together within a region are actually crumbling world over, to be replaced by stories and narratives that only bring together a fraction of the population, but perhaps enough to win elections. If the new stories and narratives only consolidate 60% of a population and are unpalatable to the remaining 40% then that is a collapse of nationalism and nationalist feelings not hyper-nationalism. Simply put, if for a vast number of people in country, their biggest fear, anger and apprehensions are over other people within the country, then that is precisely what nationalism is NOT!

PM Narendra Modi is undoubtedly on of the greatest campaigners of all time. In many ways he has replaced the stories told by the republic founding parents, most notably PM Nehru. However, the new stories, while enough to decisively win elections, have not been able to galvanize vast majority of the country, but only a fraction of the population. In that sense, BJP is winning all the battles but losing the war.

And this is not a phenomenon that always existed, this is not just people having different voting preferences. I am only 33, but old enough to remember people voting differently for different parties but after those elections united in hating their government, but still believing in the country. I am old enough to remember that Left-Right was commonly understood as a spectrum and people’s opinions were often well distributed across that spectrum, not so cleanly and sharply divided as they are today. (I had previously written a separate piece on how much our country is divided today. <A Nation Divided>)

Also, anyone seeking to defeat the BJP by merely putting together a coalition of ‘anti-BJP’ votes would be doing something just as destructive…and again may win the battle, but loose the war. Merely putting together, a coalition of anti-BJP voters to win an election (if at all possible) would mean the country would be just as divided then as it is now, just that the ‘other side’ would’ve taken control, but we’ll continue to find enemies within and consume ourselves from within.

The challenge is to once again revive or create a story or narrative that is palatable to a vast majority of people to inspire nationalist fervor. It takes extra-ordinary leadership qualities, ability to earn trust and build consensus to be able to do that I hope we’d be able to do that once again. However, perhaps putting a pause on ideas that divide and talking more about ideas that bring us together might be a good place to start.