Nationalism In Modern Europe And Its Impact On The Society

Five years ago, the revolution in Ukraine has brought the nationalists’ movement a new life, again, attracting the world’s community attention to a forgotten phenomenon. The innate desire to be unique has helped people to develop healthy competition between nations. However, what starts as healthy competition and national pride can quickly develop into hate and fear, and this is how nationalism works. It can guide nations into hate, fear of outsiders, and violence, or it can reach citizens to cherish their nation and its interests. This sense of superiority is rooted in a common ethnicity (Amadeo, 2019). This topic is worth discussion because nationalism, as a phenomenon, is a fundamental for one countries health and prosperity. Although critics argue that nationalism breeds hatred, hostility and instability, one should not forget that nationalism is a pride, it is unity and an integral part of every culture.

Most glossaries define nationalism as supporting one’s country interests to its fullest, and excluding the interests of other nations. Nationalism brings people from one same cultural the benefit of enhanced communication, on a basis of pride. This makes it easier for people to understand each other, to renegotiate alliances and to conjecture the intentions of others (Winter-Levy, & Lalwani, 2018). However, this axiom can be extended even more: nationalism is more than the ideology, it is a state of mind. One may compare nationalism to an avalanche as once it starts to come down it covers vast area destroying all obstacles on its way. And the bigger the altitude of an avalanche is the more difficult to get away from it. With that being said, nationalism break the established norms of the society which is the opposite to its essential notion.

Nationalism brings people together and creates one diverse family that follows the same idea. Nationalism meets a fundamental psychological need to belong at the individual level- it gives people a sense of security and status (Singh, 2018). Furthermore, it would be difficult for a nation to sustain in the world of constant competition without even slightest nationalistic decisions. Let’s assume nation A is eager to create something that would be appealing to their natives. Would it sell out well without having nationalistic ideas as a backbone? Maybe. But it would not sell out as well as with nationalist backbone. Moving toward free markets, we risk breaking the bond of positive nationalism and exposing their communities to the very worries and uncertainty that fuel negative nationalism (Reich, 2011). Hence, by disbalancing the nationalistic perception in society, the government takes steps in turning pride into hatred.

Nationalism, if nothing else, is a sense of national identity that converts large groups into extended families. However, there happen to exist misconceptions regarding the nationalism. By fact, modern political science holds that nationalism predisposes citizens of a country to see others as inherently inferior and bad. This belief was supposed to make, say, curtailing commerce with others and even wage war easier for nationalists. But this rationale has a problem. In itself, this doesn’t mean anything about how to handle another country. Usually we love and identify with our own family in everyday life (Wimmer, 2019). That certainly does not make us believe that there is a threat to neighboring families. The same is true of nationalism. It does not produce hatred for others, it only cares about one’s fellow citizens. In feeling that everyone is together in a national effort, people value the interests of each other as well as their own. Nationalism, in other words, makes people less narcissistic. Admittedly, the altruism provided by nationalism is not cosmopolitan kind the philosophers dream of. Leaders of a government may not care about all the world’s people, but they display selective altruism by caring for their fellow countrymen. And if embraced by all inhabitants, this limited altruism makes a better society than one inhabited by purely selfish individuals.

There is a fact: countries with a higher average level of nationalism have been consistently wealthier across the board. This evidence flies in the face of many leftists harboring anti-nationalists. But, in reality, the issue with many poorer countries is that their people are not very nationalistic. Comparing Eastern European states like Latvia and Slovenia, whose seeds of hyper nationalism are found in many concerns. Such nations, contrary to conventional wisdom, are currently among the group’s least nationalistic. Yet wealthy Western nations like Australia, Canada, and the United States are the most nationalistic. The economists have never told that it is a fair bet.

Nationalism also reduces corruption. It improves the economy for many of the same reasons. Just like political parties, public servants seeking bribery are facing an awkward trade-off: profit at the expense of fellow people. Thus, if bureaucrats are highly nationalistic, they are also more sensitive to any harm to society, and less likely to abuse public office. Nationalism also transforms the mentality of the wrongdoing-affected. A conservative society is less likely to accept injustice by the government and just look the other way. On the other hand, the purely selfish citizen may not care about corruption at all without patriotism. For this kind of person, the distilled cost of corruption in his or her life is minimal compared to the commitments needed to fight it. However, a nationalist citizenry gages the effect of corruption on the nation as a whole, and this greater concern for potential abuse triggers the collective response that keeps corruption under control.

As nationalistic citizens are more concerned about each other, they are less likely to violate the law and other people’s rights. Another striking relationship becomes evident through the use of data from the World Bank on citizens’ adherence to laws. Countries with a higher patriotism level tend to have a better rule of law. It is profoundly – and reliably – correlated with things that we admire in culture, politics, and society for all the perceived flaws of nationalism.

One can say that nationalism does not work as healthy competition in modern world (let’s be honest, it has never worked out the way people expected), on contrary, it only worsens relations between the people in one country. They see nationalism as narrow-minded and unethical, fostering a country’s blind loyalty to deeper justice and humanity commitments (Wimmer, 2019). Nationalism feeds off hate toward other nations as well as desire to be the best in the world to the unhealthy extent.

However, on the other hand, nationalism strengthen countries prosperity and develops stronger relationships between its citizens. As every phenomenon has its possible as negative, as positive ramifications, nationalism is very beneficial for every country’s internal health.

Overall, nationalism benefits society more that it harms it. Following nationalistic notions provides one nation with a rigid stem to its empowerment on the world arena. It is like playing a video game, but the person who gets nationalism possesses more power and greater communications. Nationalism is a simplistic and relativistic philosophy in politics that has tremendous influence over millions of voters and many governments. The adaptability of nationalism to most local conditions enables it to flourish, especially if it is sponsored by a state that seeks to increase its own influence domestically and internationally. To political leaders, it is an enticing philosophy, as it offers a ready-made and widely believed rationale to increased political power to make the nation great again.

References

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2. https://www.thebalance.com/nationalism-definition-examples-pros-cons-4149524.
3. Lalwani, N., & Winter-Levy, S. (2018, June 26). Analysis | When is nationalism a good thing?
4. When it unites an ethnically diverse citizenry. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/06/26/when-is-nationalism-a-good-thing-when-it-unites-an-ethnically-diverse-citizenry/.
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9. Williams, Z. (2018, May 8). Nationalism can be a good thing. We have to make the case for it |
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12. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/world/2019-02-12/why-nationalism-works.