[Menydh]

CHAPTER TWO

Nationalism as Perceived by the Modernists

The last chapter examined the fallacious dichotomy of civic and ethnic nationalism and how culture is the central unifying force within both classifications. It is culture that demonstrates how the two classifications are in practice intermeshing, even if their perceptions of culture differ. When explored as separate entities of nationalism the arguments presented by both civic and ethnic nationalism are quite convincing. In this chapter we will examine the arguments presented by the radical modernist camp in nationalist discourse, a discourse whose potency is congruent with the strengths of civic nationalism. My approach in this chapter is to demonstrate that the generally convincing modernist argument is weak in terms of its over-specificity on the determinants of nationalism and its over-generalisation concerning the consequences. It is also weak in its inability to explain nationalism beyond the terms of rationality and reason (i.e. failing to explain the non-rational emotive factor of nationalism), thus falling short of being a comprehensive theory.

There are a number of writers that may be classified as radical modernists (‘modernists’ as a shorthand description). Ernest Gellner’s theory of nationalism is arguably the most comprehensive; Tom Nairn provides the Marxist spin on nationalism; and Benedict Anderson, who views the onslaught of modernity, and with it nationalism, as a process that has taken many stages over a lengthy period of time, being a product of capitalism. In no way does this mean that each of their theories is equivalent. Gellner focuses on civic society from the perspective of liberal pluralism. Tom Nairn is more critical of the materialist aspect of nationalism and views the uneven development of capitalism as a cause for the continual rise of nationalism. His is a more internationalist perspective, and his theory occasionally criss-crosses from the modernists to the ethnicists. Benedict Anderson recognises the social construction of nation-states and presents them as "imagined communities".

Despite their differences however it is possible to recognise a common framing set of assumptions amongst these theorists. Firstly, they all recognise a cultural break between premodern and modern times; there is an elevation of the members of a community to being both social and political participants; nations are viewed as political units that are products of industrialisation and capitalism; and finally they all view nations as social constructions. As Gellner tells us, "[n]ationalism is neither universal and necessary nor contingent and accidental, the fruit of idle pens and gullible readers. It is the necessary consequence or correlate of certain social conditions".¹ It is predominantly Gellner’s theory and representation of nationalism that this chapter will address. Modernists adhere to the notion that divisions are not inherent in human nature but are the social product of modernity. Indeed divisions are not inherent in human nature, but neither are the workings of modernity equal and identical throughout humanity. The different reactions to modernity at different points in time have created differences in culture within politics. In modern Europe it is these different reactions that have developed divisions based on differentiation in experiences and history – not just in geography.

There is no clear formula of social conditions that generate nationalism beyond a united cultural base that, with the advent of major changes (such as industrialisation), strives towards nationhood. According to the modernists, particularly Gellner, this striving is in order to locate a congruence of nation and state – the principles of national self-determination. With no formula each nation or potential nation follows its own unique path toward nationhood, which may perhaps explain the absence of a clear theory of nationalism. The modernists fall short of providing a theory for a number of reasons. Anthony Smith (an ethnicist modernist who will be examined in the next chapter) provides us with a few weaknesses in the modernist argument.

1. Their generality means they cannot be easily applied to specific areas or cases.
2. Their materiality is overemphasised and misleading.
3. Nationalism as a product of modernisation overlooks the "persistence of ethnic ties and cultural sentiments". Modernists in fact disagree at the degree, if any, of connection between ethnic ties and cultural sentiments. ²

The latter point is perhaps the most important when criticising modernisation theory for though the modernists do present a valid exploration of nationalism, their conscious expulsion of the ethnic rationale in their theory leaves nationalism under modernisation theory unfulfilled. It is the first point however that is the key to locating what form the structure for the modernists and what these elements mean to nation formation and the reproduction of nationalism. The modernists are able to locate the causes of nationalism but are not successful at locating the reproduction. This chapter will begin then by examining these structural elements, the changes they have undergone and how this represents changes in subjectivity as perceived by the modernists. Other elements also to be explored include time and consciousness, and culture and ethnicity, as perceived by the modernists.

Structural Elements in Modernist Theory
Modernists rely heavily on the determinants of nation formation – those elements they believe underwent and were a part of the structural changes contributing to the nation-state, as we know it. I have already pointed out the framing set of assumptions in modernist theory: an underlying structural change, nations as political units and social constructions, and nations as products of modernity. The structural elements that comprise these framing assumptions include the market, the economy, industry, capital, and print capital. Their relationship to one another is varied and complex, likewise their respective relationship with the nation-state and nationalism is also complex. Together they introduced tools which allowed groups to proceed onto a new level of co-existence which included new levels of communication, new perceptions of time (including history and memory), and new perceptions of land and territory. In all its various manifestations this served to elevate groups to a ‘high’ culture.

These new perceptions instigated a change in the nature of the subjectivity, which in turn provoked a cultural/structural shift. This is the premise of the theory of the radical modernists. The cultural shift in particular is the basis of Gellner’s theory where culture becomes a more self-conscious active element that is now politicised due to this structural shift. This politicisation is a consequence of the change in subjectivity and elevates all members of a community now bounded by political borders to a new role of political participants, mass and elite alike. But this is where Gellner, in particular, over-generalises the consequence of these changes. Not all communities are politically bounded, and though they are now self-conscious communities they seek self-determination, but nationalism is not just national self-consciousness/determination but rather it is the determination of the unit by others.³ Gellner places great emphasis on this political reality, and on the notion that not only are self-conscious communities to be recognised, but also that these same communities are to be culturally homogeneous. Therefore the nation is considered a culturally homogeneous unit, and the nation and the state are required to be congruent – a necessity of industrial society. However this, as Smith’s first point of criticism addresses, cannot be easily applied to specific areas or cases.

In Europe there is perhaps no case of a nation-state that is culturally homogeneous and where the nation and state are completely congruent. Members of a community who consider themselves as one group are in reality not likely to be politically enclosed in the one physical space, there may be many communities existing in the one physical space. In Great Britain there are effectively four culturally distinct communities in the one political space – the Welsh, the Scottish, the Irish and the English. In addition members of these four culturally distinct communities exist beyond the political physical space of Great Britain. Diaspore communities reside in other regions of the world with strong allegiances with the homeland, whether it is Irish communities in the Unites States or the English in Australia. Throughout Europe there are numerous examples of communities that ‘spill-over’ from the political space that encloses the majority of their community to neighbouring political units. German communities are common in many areas throughout Eastern Europe, Russian minorities exist in the Baltic States and in Ukraine, Hungarian minorities reside in Romania and in rump Yugoslavia. These are communities who are self-conscious of their nationality, which may or may not be equated with ethnic categories. Whether these communities consider themselves a part of the greater society in whose political space they reside will determine whether they pose a national threat through the desire to attain their own nation-state or join the nation-state of origin. Additionally, these communities must be recognised by the host society as members of their society. Estonia for example does not recognise the national minority of Russians as citizens of Estonia but as foreigners in their land.

The progression of a group from considering themselves (and being recognised by others) as a community to being a self-conscious society is the subjective change that the modernists view as vital to the understanding of nationalism, and is pivotal in the structural change that accompanied modernity. It is the move of a group from Gemeinschaft (literally community) to Gesellschaft (society) – the great sociological dichotomy. These changes are determined by the structural elements introduced and brought to significance by modernity. Capital and industry, two such structural elements, have proliferated throughout the globe over the past two centuries, they have landed in different ways and in different places at different times, meaning they have effected different groups in different ways. As structural elements of modernity the introduction of modernity therefore varied from region to region, depending on the formation of the structural change and how they were received. Whether a group pursued modernity, or modernity infected it will also determine the temper of nationalism within particular societies.

Modernist theory contends that nations can only exist in modern societies, that is, in a Gesellschaft, and the process towards attaining this generates nationalism. Gellner believes any existence of nations prior to the modern era is merely accidental. It is only in modernity that concepts like the nation, and the nation-state can exist and where activities such as nationalism can take place. They are born out of the transition from the premodern agrarian era to the modern more urban one as societies develop and emerge through the rubric of industrialisation.⁴ The emerging new society would be centred on a literate high culture, assimilating any newcomers into it. If industrialisation is not thorough enough in assimilating the smaller groups into the larger more dominant ones, then there is the potential for another nationalism to emerge. Particularly if there is a lack of consensus on what culture(s) the political borders of a state do house.

An interesting example of a nationalism that did not completely submerge into the dominant society, but nor is it seeking to establish its own complete state is Scotland. National autonomy does exist and the nationalism that is practised is consciously civic in character; comparing its nationalism to that of its neighbours, Ireland and Wales, Scottish nationalism appears less ‘ethnic’. Some explanations for this is that industrialisation was more thorough in Scotland than it was in Ireland and Wales. More specifically, agrarian change was more rigorous in Scotland so as to disembowel peasant society, thus removing the "blood-and-soil" feature from their nationalism.⁵ In this case, according to modernisation theory, industrialisation was thorough enough to involve the Scottish society in the larger more dominant British one. They subscribed to the literate high culture of Britain. Thus Scottish nationalism still exists, but within the workings of Great Britain.

The modernists restrict nationalism to being "a series of adjustments demanded by entry into the era of modernity"⁶ but what is their fuel and what gives them strength? And why do they not go away? This is what the modernists do not have a handle on and do not clearly address. The modernist thesis contends that economic forces are responsible for modernity and modernity is responsible for nationalism. Therefore by deduction economic forces are responsible for nationalism. Clearly with industrialisation, a force of economics, the character of politics, and that of political activity, has changed. The root of this change is situated in the changes in subjectivity and thus structural changes that gave rise to new factors of significance. With the rise of capital industry there has been the emergence and rise of a middle and working class that have become new actors in the social arena, consequently altering the nature of the political arena. Industrialisation has meant that politics has progressed to become "a non-elite, then a majority, concern".⁷ By politics now becoming a majority concern and moving beyond an elite-only venture, these majorities have formed together in culturally homogeneous and politically aware groups where there social concerns are similar and thus as a group they can aspire for the same goals.

This only explains the core of nationalism in its early formation and says nothing of what perpetuates the phenomenon. Under the modernist argument nationalism should both diminish in importance and become banal, or if it persists it is as a result of changes in the economic make-up and strengths of nation-states. Thus the perpetuation of nationalism would be a consequence of competition between socio-political units who are fighting for resources, capital development and economic superiority. From an objective internationalist perspective this may be so. But how does this permeate to the masses that share the will to exercise the nationalism? Being a product of modernity it could be argued that the initial emergence of nationalism possessed many of these economic motivations and so to the masses within these units the exercise of nationalism meant the act of grabbing the benefits and/or spoils of modernity by a group of people linked together by some similar characteristics.

This still does not explain the will to do so. The desire to improve materially is a consequence not of competition but of such a large economic disparity that the mass in one group recognise the obvious and feel the difference between them and their political neighbours. The economic disparity that became ever obvious in the 1980s in the former communist countries of Eastern Europe relative to Western Europe is such an example. But nationalism was not then, and it certainly is not now, solely motivated by factors of material and economic disparity. Certainly in some circumstances economic factors may play a role, but the perpetuation and exercise of nationalism cannot be attributed to this.

Observing instances of nationalism in the latter half of this century in Europe there are many other more emotive elements that have inspired acts under the banner of nationalism – some good, some bad. In Eastern Europe since the end of the Cold War there have been various manifestations of nationalism. The violent forms of those in the former Yugoslavia, such as the Croats, Serbs, Bosnians, Macedonians and now the Kosovars; to the more peaceful of the Czechs and Slovaks; to other virulent and potentially virulent in the former Soviet Union, such as Ukraine. In each of these cases nationalism was not motivated singularly by the desire for economic progress, it was (and still is in some cases) also an issue of self-determination. This is not to discount the importance of economics in the equation. In many of the former Communist countries the primary goal of the masses was to advance economically and materially so that they could experience the same benefits as those of the West. This included the proliferation of commercialism; privatisation offering profit incentives on a more immediate level; even to the more consumer oriented demands such as McDonalds, Pepsi, Nike and access to conveniences already available in the Western countries. But it was not this that spurred the drive for individual groups to seek nationhood. Self-determination ensured that the immediate demands, and the first priority, was political recognition of sovereignty.

Economic development was a contributing factor to the desire to break away from the Soviet shadow but was not a strong factor in nationalism. A case in point is the former Yugoslavia. Economically it would have been more advantageous for this country to remain intact, for of all the former communist countries it was probably the one first in line to join the ‘West’, and especially be a contender for membership to the European Union. Instead the struggles of the various nationalisms within this region meant that all, save for Slovenia, are having difficulty re-establishing infrastructure, welfare, medical needs, etc., which has meant that economic growth and development is minimal and much damaged by the activities of the past decade. This is not to suggest that Yugoslavia was an economically prosperous country before the break-up, but the fragmentation of this country has yet to prove an economic advantage to any of the new nation-states (except for Slovenia). By comparison the break-up of the former Czechoslovakia was far less disruptive and has probably aided the Czech Republic to become more economically advanced. In addition to any economic desires particular groups may have is often coupled with wishes for democratisation also. However it was not the economic factor or the issue of democratisation that caused the break, rather it was more a consequence of individual Czech and Slovak desires for national self-determination.

It is such desires that modernisation theory over-generalises. Though Gellner recognises a subjective change in the political, social and cultural sphere, he considers these subjective changes to be objectively determined, and it is these objective elements that are over-emphasised. These objective elements are those that contribute to the structural change that occurred in modernity. But these same elements are not necessarily objective. Economics in particular may be either objective or subjective, depending on the way economic changes and situations are interpreted by any given society. Therefore subjective changes may sometimes be objectively determined or the objective may determine the subjective depending on the nature of the structural change and hence the nature of the modernity. Other structural elements also contribute or are effected by objective or subjective determinants. For example, the uneven development of industrialisation was not deliberate but it objectively determined the direction, or fates, of various groups, from centre to periphery.⁸

Civil Society and the State
The subjective changes in perception and structural changes are not the only contributors to the formation of nations and the initial development of nationalism. States are a necessary but not a sufficient condition for the formation and stabilisation of nations. It serves to maintain the high culture via its ability to sustain an educational infrastructure, making culture (a high culture) a necessary and shared medium. The nation-state is an essential element of the modernisation theory, for it is one of its central and necessary institutions. And since the nation is a social construction and the state a political one, neither are perennial. This supports the modernists’ argument of nations not being perennial, and more specifically, nationalism as a solely modernist element. Nationalism is not just the development of nations, but the development of nations to fit within demarcated states.

Modernists assert that in modernity a nation can only survive with its own state, and a culture can only be truly preserved with its own nation. Therefore nationalism is the link between state and culture⁹ as "one of the tasks of the state becomes to administer the difference between strangers for inclusion and strangers for exclusion",¹⁰ according to their cultural attributes. This is formally accomplished via citizenship, which acts as a method of social closure.¹¹ Citizenship bestows privileged rights and benefits on being a member of a politically bounded society such as freedom of movement within the bounded territory, residence, suffrage, etc. What is actually enclosed by society and the way society is bounded distinguishes one nation from the next and one nation’s nationalism from the next. France and Germany offer good examples of differentiation in citizenship, particularly when examining access to citizenship by migrants. According to Brubaker the "rate of civic incorporation for migrant workers and their descendants is more than ten times higher in France than in Germany."¹² The form of access to a particular society however does not commit the nationalism to be of a particular type, though it may influence the national character of a population.

To counterbalance the link between state and culture there must also be a civil society to make for a smooth and ‘good’ nationalism, as the modernisation theory propagates. Civil society is an eternal circumstance, a "set of diverse non-governmental institutions which is strong enough to counterbalance the state and prevent it from dominating and atomising the rest of society."¹³ Civil society is the passage of rites – a series of adjustments in between two eras.¹⁴ This is the ticket in the transitional process, the move from Gemeinschaft to Gesellschaft. The passage was taken by the ‘West’ or core societies almost two centuries ago, but in other cases is just being experienced now as societies cross the bridge from the Cold War to "wherever it is we are living now."¹⁵ A civil society may be seen as both a circumstance to be aimed for and a transitional process. It suggests a strong society less vulnerable to change. Societal strength means the ability to counter the state as an autonomous body – it is "Leviathan’s antithesis".¹⁶ The society at large must know or have access to information about the social and political processes of their society; there must be an educated public (the existence of a high culture); this public must be mobile (not tied to the land as under rural conditions); and their must exist "the ability to organize autonomous organizations free from government surveillance". These points are definitive of a civil society. ¹⁷

Civil society is required to instigate a ‘civic’ social order, which subsequently aligns the modernist argument with the theoretical concept of a civic nationalism, perpetuating the dichotomy between civic and ethnic nationalism. By essentialising the importance of industrialisation and the break with pre-modern times, all the factors of pre-modern societies are not given value. Their strength is not acknowledged. In examining current influences it is decided that only elements of modernity influence modern societies, suggesting then that it is only the modern national character that determines the social, and hence moral, order of a society.

Civil Society is needed for non-destructive progress and in the absence of both democracy and civil society nationalism is malleable enough to be an instrument of absolutism. Therefore a brief comment needs to be made about democracy in this context. There is a connection between strong societies and civil societies and democracy, but this is not to say that democracy is the key to developing a strong society. Rather, history has shown that democracy has emerged from strong urban centres. With the collapse of the authoritarian regimes of Eastern Europe there has been the gradual emergence of a democratic culture, or at least a democratic alternative – "the reconstruction of civil society from below."¹⁸ However it may not be the reconstruction of a civil society for there may never have been the foundations of one from which to reconstruct, which suggests no experience in democracy by a given society. This is often the case with some of the nations of Eastern Europe. Only a few have had an experience with a democratic culture, such as Poland and the Czech Republic to a limited degree, thus the development or emergence of a civil society may be completely different. Even if these new nation-states do successfully democratise, democracy alone is not enough in these societies as it supports nationalism.

In cases where civil society is being reconstructed it is from the ruins of old societies. The Czech Republic must not only search its history to tap into experiences of democratic culture in the past, but must also work to salvage the remnants of any civil society that may have developed under Czechoslovakia. The new nation-states of the former Yugoslavia must also do the same. A Yugoslav culture barely existed, so too a civil society. Nevertheless, though immersed in false consciousness and the promotion of folk culture, the former Yugoslavia represented tools by which a civil society was being developed and nurtured. This included mixed-market socialism and the absence of restrictions as imposed on the other communist countries in Eastern Europe. However, with the dismantling of the former Yugoslavia all these possibilities have been dismantled, the upside being that the Yugoslav false consciousness has also been dismantled. The ensuing ‘democracies’ are now faced with the task of ‘reconstructing’ via new methods and with new instruments. This reconstruction is to involve the development of a civil society, structural change in the form of the nature of the market, the functioning of economics (particularly with the development of the European Union) the growth of industry and capital, as well as technology. In adopting these forces however as the foundation of nationalism, this philosophy becomes restricted to being only a forward-looking ideology (that is, it draws only on the need to progress and look forward without examining why nationalism also looks to the past for strength). In this context the use of time is important to the nature of and nationalism and especially the nature of its perpetuation.

Time and Consciousness
History and memory are often what lend strength to the present and what fuel nationalism. With this in mind time becomes an important component in understanding the exercise and vigour of nationalism, particularly in the observance of the past and when appealing to the collective consciousness. The aim is to ensure that this collective consciousness is not a false one. False consciousness is any involuntary abdication of civic and political rights and activity in the belief that the state or some higher being can act in their stead. It exists in the absence of a social framework independent of state bodies. Though a population may be educated they are not social and political participants of the community. False consciousness must be overcome for a civil society to develop and a high culture to emerge. According to Gellner the development of a civil society is also a case of less false consciousness. But less false consciousness does not immediately imply clear and concise consciousness. To acquire a coherent consciousness would mean the acquisition of a unitary one.¹⁹

False consciousness exists in societies where there has been socio-political collapse, the un(der)development of democracy, or the rule of authoritarian regimes. Industrialisation, according to the modernisation theory, served to progressively eliminate false consciousness as it permeated successfully throughout society. Though depending on what variants of industrialisation were undertaken would also determine the extent of elimination of false consciousness. A liberal democratic viewpoint suggests that there is greater false consciousness within Marxism than capitalism – "capitalism seems considerably more efficient, and commits the society undergoing it to far less false consciousness concerning its own organization, than does socialism."²⁰ Even more important than the elimination of false consciousness is the acquisition of a unitary consciousness. Industrialisation made this possible via print capitalism. As Benedict Anderson points out, it was the newspaper and the novel that made the nation imaginable. ²¹

Communities need a vehicle by which they can maintain a sense of immortality. Anderson claims that print-capitalism provided the means by which people could first ‘imagine’ a community and secondly identify with this greater community via the advanced means of communication, regardless of the anonymity of the other members.²² A general consciousness exists whereby members of the community are aware that they share the same homogenous culture, the same time and memory, and identify the same space as belonging to their own imagined community.²³ Though the existence or absence of false consciousness does not make a society more or less susceptible to nationalism, the existence of a general and unitary consciousness does.

Within nationalism it is the "ism" that is a "general consciousness" shared by a population.²⁴ Whether this general consciousness is a false one may depend on other influences and subjective features in the society. Namely, other ideologies that may permeate a population, and demand social conditions that may be misrepresented to the masses via false consciousness.²⁵ By affecting a population’s consciousness the sense of "now" is changed, where the past becomes the future and time is now. It makes nationhood, which is imbedded in this, perennial. As Nairn tells us:

All cultures have been obsessed by the dead and placed them in another world. Nationalism rehouses them in this world. Through its agency the past ceases being ‘immemorial’: it gets memorialised into time present, and so acquires a future. For the first time it is meaningfully projected on to the screen of futurity. ²⁶

History then plays an important role. It must be interpreted in a particular manner and remembered in a particular way so that there is a uniform and unitary memory amongst the people of the one nation. This unitary memory is necessary to form a unitary consciousness. Therefore time is a vital component of nationalism and an important tool for nationalists. Attachment to the past and aspirations for the future are combined with a homogeneous high culture to create a concrete social bond within a population. As James states: "The past becomes a place to be visited either for verification of contemporary progress or, more recently, as a source of comparative knowledge for humanists, anthropologists and tourists."²⁷ History gives the people of a nation, both the elite and the mass, their strength and provides the devices used to shape a unitary memory. This is achieved via emotional appeal. It is precisely this area that is not explored thoroughly enough by the modernists.

Collective memory plays an important role in cultivating and defining a national identity and provides a major link to cultural pasts. If there is no memory, then there is no identity, and with no identity there is no nation. This is the key to making the process of nationalism successful.²⁸ Along with collective memory there is also the notion of "collective amnesia"²⁹ in trying to detach oneself from a past and "collective immortality"³⁰ in trying to salvage all connection with the past (real or not). This occurs when new nation-states form in retaliation to a dominant force. Theorists often identify collective memory, collective amnesia and collective identity as products of ethnic nationalism.³¹ It certainly features in nationalism where ethnicity plays a strong role.³² But it also appears in typically civic nationalisms. France possesses a unitary (collective) memory of 1789 and Britain possesses a unitary memory of its colonial power days – unitary/collective memory does exist in cases typically defined as being examples of civic nationalism. However, mixed with emotion the memory becomes more malleable. This allows the memory to be utilised in perceiving the people themselves as superior to others, the dominant race. Such was the example of a unitary, collective memory in Germany under Hitler.

It is only by remembering the past that a collective identity, an imagined community, can be given life.³³ So where Gellner, for example, looks forward and regards progress (particularly economic) as the quintessential motivation of nationalism, it is in fact the past that gives the people the will to partake in and exercise nationalism. The past is delivered to the present for the masses to re-experience – to partake in the emotions of past glories again. Memory makes the history instant. Memory leads to identity which leads to the imagining of the nation. And this coupled with Gellner’s desire for the growth of political units leads to the inspiration for a group to obtain their own nation-state.

Therefore, history becomes instant because time is now. This instant history is an amalgamation of the positive history, or more accurately, selective history of the past, which provides the state and the elite with a usable past by which to achieve their objectives.³⁴ This is done more often in instances of the existence of a false consciousness, and a lack of experience of liberal democracy by a society in the past. Therefore this instant history is often filled with reflections on past societies, and the lamentations on the values of the past, in order to give the present substance. But as pointed out by the Slovenian sociologist, Slavoj Zizek, these lamentations "over the forgotten past Values is itself oblivious to the fact that these Values had no existence previous to our lamenting – that we literally invented them through out lamenting over their loss…".³⁵ When the past is valued in such a way, particularly as a way to compensate for current absences, the easiest and most popularly appealing tools are used. This is often the modern construct of past ethnic groups.

Culture and Ethnicity
Where civil society is the institutional Geist, it is ethno-nationalist behaviour that is the spirit of the peasant. It is the rural haunting the urban.³⁶ For nationalism to emerge and be exercised as a true product of modernity, as the modernists assess, and not have to resort to factors inconsistent to modernity in order to deliver the desired results of a nation-state (such as ethnicity) modernists require the existence of a civil society. This would provide the correct environment and instruments by which nationalism could flourish. It is still culture however that provides the foundation of any nationalism possibly emerging.

"Men have always been endowed with culture" – and so begins Ernest Gellner’s final book on nationalism, published posthumously. It is the type of culture that a population possesses that is important to whether a people are conducive or resistant to nationalism. Most cultures that have actively pursued to preserve or assert their culture in the modern age do so by seeking to house it in a nation-state. This pursuit, or activity towards nationhood and statehood, means that the manifestation of nationalism is possible and likely. The nature of the culture will also determine to some extent the nature of the nationalism. According to modernists the nature of the culture is determined by factors that include literacy, levels of communication, social relationships and social conditions unique to particular groups. These stem from the changes that motivated industrialisation.

A perception of what culture is maintains the divide between the modernists and the ethnicists and likewise of conceptions of civic nationalism and ethnic nationalism. This is especially true concerning the role of ethnicity in nationalist discourse. It is not wholly true that modernists do not take into account ethnicity as asserted by the primordialists, rather, they recognise fault-lines and the importance of culture. The key is recognising the link between culture and ethnicity and the brevity of this link. The question then arises, does ethnicity produce a particular type of culture, or is it cultural diversity that is important, thus demonstrating the importance of ethnicity in providing a method of diversity?

Culture is detached from genetic transmission but allows for traits, activities, language, food, etc., to be carried on from generation to generation.³⁷ Culture then is no longer dependent on genetics. Ethnicity however is seen by the modernists as a representation of the genetic constitution of a group of people. So the removal of the dependency of culture on genetics rules out the necessity and relevance of ethnicity in determining nationalism under the modernisation theory, removing ethnicity from the core of nationalism, while not necessarily from the influence of nationalism. What modernisation theory fails to identify is that the cultural break instigated by modernity produced a change in ethnicity also. It too was politicised, and to some extent a break in ethnic perceptions occurred. But in examining nationalism we are not only interested in what lies at its core, but also in the factors that perpetuate it. This is where the modernist theory falls short.

Certainly ethnicity offers some explanation to the nature of some nationalisms, but it in itself is not a comprehensive explanation thus modernists reject the claim outright. Ernest Gellner, in defending the modernist camp against the idea that those elements important in the pre-modern era are primary and definitive to the meaning and nature of nationalism in the modern era, asked, "Do nations have navels?" What he was referring to was whether nations have a point in which they began, and if so what relevance does this point hold in determining the nature of the nation’s nationalism.³⁸ The question refers to the relevance of ethnicity to the body of nationalism (the navel representing ethnicity in relation to the human body as a metaphor for the nation). Gellner’s argument was that after a nation is born the navel is merely a decorative feature of its body and holds no functional purpose. What Gellner declined to acknowledge as being important was the issue of where we come from, where our origins lie. Ethnicity is no longer just a measure of what genetic group we belong to, it now represents a unique feature of a community transmitted organically, ultimately characterising a society. Ethnicity is a variant of culture, and as culture was politicised with the onset of modernity so too was ethnicity.

Whether we have a navel or not will not effect our well being but it does represent our origins, which influences the nature of our behaviour. Likewise, the origins of a population will influence the nature of the nationalism practiced. More importantly this representation of the past is more a symbolic feature than a physical one. The core of a nation may not predispose it to a particular type of nationalism, but the way in which it is remembered and the way it is transmitted into a society acts as a particular motivator in the exercise of nationalism. This is the importance of the ethnic rationale. Adam did not have a navel but a scar, and this scar and the navels of his descendants represents that element within us that threads us to the past.

The ethnic element of nationalism is a tool of mobilisation used by the elite. But the incorporation of this ingredient directs us towards one of the problems with Nairn’s thesis, which is also the primordialist problem of essentialism. Though categorised as a modernist, elements of Nairn’s theory possess characteristics of ethnicism, and perhaps then a softer ‘soft primordialism’ than that of Smith. It is Nairn’s consideration of ethnicity, rurality and peasant culture in his theory that demonstrates weaknesses with some elements of it and keeps his theory unfulfilled. In criss-crossing between the ethnicist-modernists and the radical modernists Nairn fails to identify explicitly with what he regards as the core or essence of nationalism leaving the foundation of his theory slightly equivocal. Nairn, in framing his theory, recognises the historic existence of states, and from it the emergence of nations and the importance of ethnicity as a tool of nationalism. But accepting that the state and nation are historically embedded elements pits Nairn with the perennialists who assert the antiquity of the phenomenon of the nation. The impotency of this factor impairs the theory of nationalism as a function of these agents.

Conclusion
Nairn claims that industrialisation is an accident that occurred to some populations and those who were "unblessed" "reacted" to it. It was this reaction that "injected the ‘-ism’ into nationhood."³⁹ However nationalism is not accidental nor reactionary, nor is it premeditated in its foundations. The theory of nationalism must not diverge away from the thesis that nationalism is a manifestation of modernity – here the modernists are correct. The method by which modernity arrived will determine the character of the nationalism. Its flavour may occasionally be accidental or reactionary, but by no means does this denote the core of nationalism. The process of nationhood is a manifestation of modernity, but the –ism of it is the response.

Though Gellner is a stern modernist he still never fully resolved the role of the pre-modern in nationalism, despite rejecting any responsibility on the part of pre-modern societies in engendering nationalism. But throughout his theory, and that of other modernists, he suggests that this was not a fully resolved issue. "Bureaucratic centralisation by the Enlightened Despots of the eighteenth century certainly helped prepare the ground for nationalism."⁴⁰ (My emphasis) What if it had not "prepared the ground" and industrialism emerged anyhow (for the sake of argument) would nationalism still have emerged? What if industrialisation emerged but there was no division of society according to culture or ethnicity? It is true that nationalism is the product of industrialisation but the way in which it is exercised is determined by elements that exist both within and without the modernist framework. As Gellner admits, nationalism "was indeed our destiny". ⁴¹

It is true that the –ism did not exist in agrarian societies, mainly because the high culture was restricted to the elite only. ‘Politics’ then was confined to these quarters. It was not until politics became an aspect of the social lives of the majority that nationalism was introduced, and this only occurred with modernity. It is an essential feature of modernity, along with industrialisation. It is precisely the setting of nationalism and industrialisation within modernity and the relationship between the two that may determine whether modernist theory will remain inflexible and uncompromising to the ideas proposed by those in the ethnicist camp. Most theorists, on both sides, will agree that there are flavours of both sides in a true and comprehensive theory (if there really is one) of nationalism. It is just the degree of importance associated with these factors that is disputed.

This is not to disprove the modernists, but rather to highlight the main problem with their thesis, and that is acknowledging the importance of the ethnic rationale as an element of culture. This problem acts as a constant obstacle to applying the modernisation theory of nationalism in specific cases. More specifically, the theory of nationalism from this perspective fails to recognise the importance of ethnicity in nationalism, particularly in contemporary Europe where it is becoming a more pressing feature rather than a redundant one.

The assumption of this chapter is that nationalism is indeed rooted in modernity. It is modernity that carries the foundations of the necessary conditions that were to give birth to nations and oversee the subsequent activity of nationalism. However, the characteristics of nationalism are drawn from not only modernity but from features that preceded it. Without these features there would be nothing to fuel the continuum of any particular nationalism.

Culture to the ethnicists is the mainstay of a community, and a politicised culture is the centre of a political community. The modernists, and particularly Gellner, who places paramount importance on a high culture in the development of a society in modernity, also acknowledge this. The ethnicists however perceive culture as the thread to what ties the nation to the past, delivering it to the future, locating the ethnie as the nucleus of a society’s culture and what makes one culture different to the next. The major schism between the ethnicists and the modernists occurs in the perception of history’s relationship to culture, and the degree of importance of ethnicity within culture. On the flip side, by over focusing their energies on the virtues of ethnicity, ethnicists have undermined the importance of culture in the relationship and detached themselves from explaining nationalisms where the most prominent factor is not ethnicity. Consequently, ethnicists have reduced themselves to providing a theory concerning ethnic nationalism only. This will now be examined in the next chapter.