Unit 4: Nationalism - 2 short answer mark schemes

Why have liberals argued that nationalism promotes peace and international order? 

Liberals have argued that nationalism promotes peace and international order in a number of ways, including the following:

For liberals, the primary threat to peace and international order comes from multinational, autocratic empires. This is because they have traditionally been militaristic and expansionist, having been formed through conquest and routinely use military force to further their internal and external ends.

After WWI, liberals such as Woodrow Wilson thus sought to re-draw the map of Europe on the basis of the principle of national self-determination. Liberal nationalists believed that nation-state are naturally peaceful political formations.

This has been explained in a number of ways, including the following:

nation-states enjoy sovereign independence and so are unwilling to threaten the sovereign independence of other nations expansion and conquest would undermine the political and cultural cohesion that makes nation-states so successful o democratic nation-states share a common culture and so are unwilling to fight one another, and are also accountable to the people who will have to fight, kill and die in the event of war.

Distinguish between nationalism and racialism.

Nationalism, broadly, is the belief that the nation is the central principle of political organisation. The nation is a collection of people bound together by shared values and traditions, common language, religion and history, and usually occupying the same geographical area. Nationalism is therefore based upon two core assumptions.

First, humankind is naturally divided into discrete nations and, second, the nation is the most appropriate, and perhaps the only legitimate, unit of political rule. Classical political nationalism set out to bring the borders of the state into line with the boundaries of the nation, creating nation-states within which nationality and citizenship would coincide. Nationalism, in this sense, is associated with a principled belief in national self-determination.

However, nationalism is a complex and highly diverse ideological phenomenon, encompassing a range of political manifestations as well as cultural and ethnic forms.

Racism, broadly, is the belief that political or social conclusions can be drawn from the idea that humankind is divided into biologically distinct ‘races’ whereas nations are cultural entities, races are genetic or biological entities.

Strictly speaking, racial origin is irrelevant to national identity, at least for inclusive forms of nationalism. Racialist theories are based on two assumptions.

First, there are fundamental genetic or species type, differences amongst the peoples of the world and, second, these divisions are reflected in cultural, intellectual and moral differences. Politically, it either implies racial segregation (for instance, apartheid) or doctrines of racial superiority or inferiority. The idea of a racial hierarchy leads to the systematic subordination of peoples on the basis of their ethnic origin, sometimes also providing the justification for conquest and expansionism.