View source for Gellner's theory of nationalism

{{Short description|Modernist theory by Ernest Gellner}}
'''Gellner's theory of nationalism''' was developed by [[Ernest Gellner]] over a number of publications from around the early 1960s to his 1995 death.<ref name=ERIKSEN/><ref name=OLEARY/> Gellner discussed nationalism in a number of works, starting with ''[[Thought and Change]]'' (1964), and he most notably developed it in ''[[Nations and Nationalism (book)|Nations and Nationalism]]'' (1983).<ref name=OLEARY/> His theory is [[Modernization theory (nationalism)|modernist]].
==Characteristics==
Gellner defined [[nationalism]] as "primarily a political principle which holds that the political and the national unit should be congruent"<ref>Gellner, ''Nations and Nationalism'', 1983, p. 1.</ref> and as <blockquote>the general imposition of a high culture on society, where previously low cultures had taken up the lives of the majority, and in some cases the totality, of the population. It means the general diffusion of a school-mediated, academy supervised idiom, codified for the requirements of a reasonably precise bureaucratic and technological communication. It is the establishment of an anonymous impersonal society, with mutually sustainable atomised individuals, held together above all by a shared culture of this kind, in place of the previous complex structure of local groups, sustained by folk cultures reproduced locally and idiosyncratically by the micro-groups themselves.<ref>Gellner, ''Nations and Nationalism'' p. 57</ref></blockquote>
Gellner analyzed nationalism by a historical perspective.<ref name="Leoussi">{{cite book|first=Kenneth |last=Minogue|author-link=Kenneth Minogue|chapter=Gellner's Theory of Nationalism: A Critical Assessment|editor=Athena S. Leoussi|title=Encyclopaedia of Nationalism|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9_vuJusOJkMC&pg=PA107|publisher=Transaction Publishers|isbn=978-1-4128-2255-8|pages=107–109}}</ref> He saw the [[history of humanity]] culminating in the discovery of [[modernity]], nationalism being a key functional element.<ref name="Leoussi"/> Modernity, by changes in political and economic system, is tied to the popularization of education, which, in turn, is tied to the unification of language.<ref name="Leoussi"/> However, as modernization spread around the world, it did so slowly, and in numerous places, cultural elites were able to resist [[cultural assimilation]] and defend their own culture and language successfully.<ref name="Leoussi"/>
For Gellner, nationalism was a sociological condition<ref name="Leoussi"/> and a likely but not guaranteed (he noted exceptions in multilingual states like [[Switzerland]], [[Belgium]] and [[Canada]]<ref name=OLEARY/>) result of modernisation, the transition from agrarian to industrial society.<ref name=ERIKSEN/><ref name=OLEARY/> His theory focused on the political and cultural aspects of that transition.<ref name=ERIKSEN/> In particular, he focused on the unifying and culturally homogenising roles of the educational systems, national labour markets and improved communication and mobility in the context of [[urbanisation]].<ref name=ERIKSEN/> He thus argued that nationalism was highly compatible with industrialisation and served the purpose of replacing the ideological void left by both the disappearance of the prior agrarian society culture and the political and economical system of [[feudalism]], which it legitimised.<ref name=ERIKSEN/><ref name=OLEARY/>
[[Thomas Hylland Eriksen]] lists these as "some of the central features of nationalism" in Gellner's theory:<ref name=ERIKSEN/>
* Shared, formal educational system
* [[Cultural homogenization|Cultural homogenisation]] and "social entropy"
* Central monitoring of polity, with extensive bureaucratic control
* Linguistic standardisation
* National identification as abstract community
* Cultural similarity as a basis for political legitimacy
* Anonymity, single-stranded social relationships
Gellner also provided a typology of "nationalism-inducing and nationalism-thwarting situations".<ref name=OLEARY/>
Gellner criticised a number of other theoretical explanations of nationalism, including the "naturality theory", which states that it is "natural, self-evident and self-generating" and a basic quality of human being, and a neutral or a positive quality; its dark version, the "Dark Gods theory", which sees nationalism as an inevitable expression of basic human atavistic, irrational passions; and [[Elie Kedourie]]'s idealist argument that it was an accidental development, an intellectual error of disseminating unhelpful ideas, and not related to industrialisation and the [[Marxism|Marxist]] theory in which nations appropriated the leading role of social classes.<ref name=OLEARY/>
On October 24, 1995, at [[Warwick University]], Gellner debated one of his former students, [[Anthony D. Smith]] in what became known as the Warwick Debates. Smith presented an  ethnosymbolist view, Gellner a modernist one. The debate has been described as epitomizing their positions.<ref name="Mylonas">{{cite journal |last1=Mylonas |first1=Harris |last2=Tudor |first2=Maya |title=Nationalism: What We Know and What We Still Need to Know |journal=Annual Review of Political Science |date=11 May 2021 |volume=24 |issue=1 |pages=109–132|doi-access=free |doi=10.1146/annurev-polisci-041719-101841 |url=https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/full/10.1146/annurev-polisci-041719-101841 |access-date=27 September 2021}}</ref><ref name="ASEN">{{cite journal |title=The nation: real or imagined? The Warwick Debates On Nationalism  |journal=Nations and Nationalism |date=1996|publisher=Association for the Study of Ethnicity and Nationalism (ASEN) |volume=2 |issue=3 |pages=357-370 |url=https://www.readcube.com/articles/10.1111%2Fj.1469-8219.1996.tb00001.x |access-date=27 September 2021}}</ref><ref name="Anthony Smith">{{cite book|last1=Smith|first1=Deanna|year=2007|title=Nationalism|edition=2nd|publisher=polity|location=Cambridge|isbn=978-0-7456-5128-6}}</ref>
==Influence==
Gellner is considered one of the leading theoreticians on nationalism. Eriksen notes that "nobody contests Ernest Gellner's central place in the research on nationalism over the last few decades".<ref name=ERIKSEN>{{cite journal|last1=Eriksen|first1=Thomas Hylland|author-link=Thomas Hylland Eriksen|title=Nationalism and the Internet|journal=Nations and Nationalism|date=January 2007|volume=13|issue=1|pages=1–17|doi=10.1111/j.1469-8129.2007.00273.x}}</ref> O'Leary refers to the theory as "the best-known modernist explanatory theory of nationalism".<ref name=OLEARY>{{cite journal|last1=O'Leary|first1=Brendan|author-link=Brendan O'Leary|title=On the Nature of Nationalism: An Appraisal of Ernest Gellner's Writings on Nationalism|journal=British Journal of Political Science|date=April 1997|volume=27|issue=2|pages=191–222|doi=10.1017/S0007123497000112|url=https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1046&context=economicsperg_ppe}}</ref>
==Criticisms==
Gellner's theory has been subject to various criticisms:<ref name=OLEARY/>
*It is too [[structural functionalism|functionalist]], as it explains the phenomenon with reference to the eventual historical outcome that industrial society could not 'function' without nationalism.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Tambini|first1=Damian|title=Explaining monoculturalism: Beyond Gellner's theory of nationalism|journal=Critical Review|date=March 1996|volume=10|issue=2|pages=251–270|doi=10.1080/08913819608443420}}</ref>
*It misreads the relationship between nationalism and industrialisation.<ref name="Smith1998">{{cite book|first=Anthony D.|last=Smith|author-link=Anthony D. Smith|title=Nationalism and Modernism: A Critical Survey of Recent Theories of Nations and Nationalism|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WN9QWehYDKIC|year=1998|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-0-415-06341-8}} {{page needed|date=March 2015}}</ref>
*It accounts poorly for national movements of [[Ancient Rome]] and [[Ancient Greece|Greece]] since it insists that nationalism is tied to modernity and so cannot exist without a clearly defined modern industrialisation.<ref name="Leoussi"/><ref name="Smith1995">{{cite book|first=Anthony D.|last=Smith|title=Nations and Nationalism in a Global Era|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nM4hKNaPo_cC|date=3 August 1995|publisher=Wiley|isbn=978-0-7456-1019-1}} {{page needed|date=March 2015}}</ref>
*It fails to account for either nationalism in non-industrial society and resurgences of nationalism in [[post-industrial society]].<ref name="Smith1998"/>
*It fails to account for nationalism in 16th-century Europe.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Smith|first1=Anthony D.|title=Nationalism in Early Modern Europe|journal=History and Theory|date=October 2005|volume=44|issue=3|pages=404–415|doi=10.1111/j.1468-2303.2005.00332.x}}</ref>
*It cannot explain the passions generated by nationalism and why anyone should fight and die for a country.<ref name="Connor1994">{{cite book|first=Walker|last=Connor|author-link=Walker Connor|title=Ethnonationalism: The Quest for Understanding|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bmgineq0r3MC|year=1994|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-0-691-02563-6}} {{page needed|date=March 2015}}</ref>
* It fails to take into account either the role of war and the military in fostering both cultural homogenisation and nationalism or the relationship between [[militarism]] and [[compulsory education]].<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Conversi|first1=Daniele|title=Homogenisation, nationalism and war: Should we still read Ernest Gellner?|journal=Nations and Nationalism|date=July 2007|volume=13|issue=3|pages=371–394|doi=10.1111/j.1469-8129.2007.00292.x}}</ref>
* It has been compared to [[technological determinism]], as it disregards the views of individuals.<ref name="Leoussi"/>
[[Philip S. Gorski|Philip Gorski]] has argued that modernization theorists, such as Gellner, have gotten the timing of nationalism wrong: nationalism existed prior to modernity, and even had medieval roots.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Gorski|first=Philip S.|date=2000|title=The Mosaic Moment: An Early Modernist Critique of Modernist Theories of Nationalism|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/210435|journal=American Journal of Sociology|volume=105|issue=5|pages=1428–1468|doi=10.1086/210435|issn=0002-9602}}</ref>
==References==
{{reflist|30em}}
==Further reading==
*{{cite journal|first=Martina|last=Topic|url=http://www.intersticios.es/article/view/7261 |title=Nations and Nationalism: Questioning Ernest Gellner's Theory|journal=Inicio|volume=5|issue=1|year=2011}}
[[Category:Nationalism studies]]
[[Category:Sociological theories]]
[[Category:Political science theories]]