Review of “Imagined Communities” by Benedict Anderson (ISBN 9781844670864)
Benedict Anderson writes in a florid style, using metaphors where descriptive phrases would be more useful, which often forces you to reread a long paragraph in order to find the simple idea buried within. It is quite annoying, yet Anderson’s distillation of the features of nationalism is valuable for a patient reader. That said, I don’t agree with everything he writes, as you will see.
“Imagined Communities” takes us through many phases and factors in the development of nationalist thought. Anderson makes a few initial generalizations: that nationalists insist their nations are far older than historians would agree; that nationalism is “normal”; that pan-nationalism is thought to be aberrant; that the political power of nationalism is incredibly strong when compared to its thin and flimsy philosophical foundation and its incoherence. We seem to be dealing here with something as dangerous and tantalizing as a narcotic.
Anderson’s definition of a “nation” is an “imagined political community” – not merely invented but invented out of whole cloth. Its cultural and psychological roots are a preoccupation with death and sacrifice (example: the unknown soldier). Nationalism on the surface is incredibly similar to religion: it addresses many of the same needs for belonging and individual meaning. In this Anderson takes pains to disavow a causal link, but he points out that nationalism arose just as religion was being eclipsed by secularism in the 18th century.
Looking at nationalism anthropologically, religions and nations share a sacred language (Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Arabic, etc.). The sacred language (referred to as a “truth-language”) is necessary for the transmission of sacred texts which convey foundation myths. Consequently nationalists often insist on the use of a particular language since it is central to establishing nationalist narratives and propagating them.
A king’s legitimacy stemmed directly from God. Dynastic rule was possible because one’s father or ur-father was the man God had anointed to lead his people. An easily understood reason for God’s anointing of the king was sacrifice. For example, in Judaism, the near sacrifice of Isaac was necessary to establish legitimacy for the story of biblical Israel that would follow. It involved a truth-language (Hebrew), and cosmology blending seamlessly into history. But when did Abraham actually live? The question has sent historians scrambling for answers. In later years, the story of biblical Israel would become linked to the foundation of a modern state.
Printing and the Reformation weakened “truth languages” as millions of publications were issued in German, French, English, and other “vulgar” languages. When Luther posted his theses, they were printed in German. Protestantism replaced Catholicism, German replaced Latin, and married clerics replaced a supposedly celibate hierarchy led by a Pope whose legitimacy stemmed all the way back to Saint Peter. It was quite a shakeup: language had become the central feature of nationalism, not God.
The Holy Roman Empire operated on Latin which was not only a “truth language” but a pan-national language. When the Church finally lost its absolute control over Europe, the alliances and marriages joining the royalty of diverse nations meant that the royalty did not always speak the language of its subjects. For example, the Habsburgs ruled Magyars, Croats, Slovaks, Italians, Ukrainians, and Austro-Germans; the Turks ruled over a similar polyglot empire. And both were hated by everyone – the Habsburgs for their choice of administrative language, German, and the Turks for propagating their language.
But the bourgeoisie did speak the people’s language. To this class was left the responsibility of directly managing peasants, who were happy to have their local languages elevated. Slowly, local (“national”) languages became the standard among not only serfs and middle management, but by the kings themselves.
To language were added additional trappings – flags, inherited nobility, anthems, national stories of sacrifice – all intended to create “buy in” from the serfs. And all “imagined” in the sense that they were actually of fairly recent vintage. Even in the United States, Anderson points out, this was the case. Americans may have been the riffraff of Europe, but each of the founding states had its own anthems, flags, nobility (Penns and Carrolls, for example), their genealogies and generals. A war was fought to preserve an amalgam of states which itself had only existed a couple of generations. But by the time of the Civil War an imagined nation whose legitimacy derived directly from God’s grace had to be preserved at all cost. (I find it interesting that American nationalism seems to have only partially digested European nationalism. In many parts of our country inhabitants still identify with the “Old Country” – Scots/Irish, German, Quebecois (who in turn identify with their Old Country, France), Italian, Ashkenazi Jewish communities, and others)
With the establishment of the League of Nations, the “nation-state” became the norm. Empires and dynasties were on the way out. The last European empire dissolved in 1974 with the end of Portuguese dictatorship. By the early 20th Century subjects of former empires all began wanting their own nations too. Arabia, India, Israel… But Imperialism came hand-in-hand with nationalism. By the 19th Century every self-respecting “nation” was expected to have some sort of Imperial project to despoil and pillage neighbors or the Third World.
It is impossible to be honest with one’s citizenry about the reasons for subjugating another people. And it’s impossible to be honest with those brought under the heel. Consequently, propaganda has always been a feature of the nation state. It turns out, the stories invented for legitimizing the subjugation of another people are closely related to the stories invented to establish the legitimacy of one’s own “nation.” And education fulfills this function. Schools have always been necessary for normalizing national values and propagating national myth. It is no coincidence that long after European colonists left India or the Dutch Indies the educational institutions they created still exist. At first the purpose was to instill the values of the settler state, but now the same institutions promote their own fledgling nationalism.
But the lures of nationalism don’t entirely depend on language. Toward the end of his chapter on the last waves of nation-state formation, Anderson brings up the case of Switzerland, a polyglot federation. Many historians contend that Switzerland never really became a state in any real sense before 1813, that in 1891 the Swiss were late-comers to European nationalism. And it wasn’t until this year, right on the verge of the 20th Century, that they decided to look back 600 years and declare the “real origin” of the Swiss nation as the year 1291. They had rehabilitated a long-standing “Confederation” and re-invented it as a “nation.” Schlomo Sand has an even more controversial theory about the “invention” of Israel.
The last waves of nationalism occurred in Africa and Asia. As empires struggled to educate and standardize native-staffed bureaucracies, and as global Capitalism exploited new markets, schools, the media, laws, and language began forming all the trappings of modern nation-states (it took Anderson 3 pages to say this). It wasn’t long before the natives became restless, and then not much longer until they had established their own nationalisms. The 20th Century saw a frenzy of people desperate to form themselves into nations.
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The last part of the book is equally fascinating because Anderson addresses patriotism and racism, both contemporary features of nationalism – especially in the United States.
Anderson contends that patriotism is almost exclusively presented in the language of love – admittedly, love of a very narrow and inflexible sort. Individuals may not deviate from this “love” – expressed as devotion, purity of heart, willingness to sacrifice even one’s life – or they will be hated. Anderson poses the provocative question – “Can the reader think immediately of even three hymns of hate?” (apparently he had not read the third stanza of the “Star Spangled Banner”). Militarism epitomizes the ideal of willingness to sacrifice for the nation, and it shares many of the same features of religion (observe a military funeral – equal parts nationalism and God).
Because we have now encountered a state based on ideology and myth, Anderson makes the case that anti-Semitism and racism are not necessarily derived from nationalism, that their roots are actually based in class. The ruler is divine, the aristocracy well-bred and cultivated, deserving of their rights to govern serfs and peasants. All are protecting the destiny of a people.
“The fact of the matter is that nationalism thinks in terms of historical destinies, while racism dreams of external contaminations. […] The dreams of racism actually have their origin in ideologies of class rather than nation.”
Anderson goes on to say that, because racism is class-based:
“… on the whole, racism and anti-Semitism manifest themselves not across national boundaries, but within them. In other words, they justify not so much foreign wars as domestic repression and domination.”
This assertion is impossible to reconcile with actual history. In Nazi Europe millions of Poles were murdered. In the Americas, colonial powers waged genocidal wars on natives across the seas. The United States is currently waging a war on Muslims half a world away. The atomic bomb was not used against Europeans but against Asians. Life is cheap when Europeans are not involved.
In the British empire Lords were the supreme aristocrats. But in the colonies, even the petit bourgeoisie scrambling for advantage or exiled, could “play aristocrat.” They could have their mansions, cooks, houseboys, and horses. And they could have their slaves. From India to the Americas, brown-skinned people were subjugated to the whims of Eurotrash. And while Anderson’s theory is that this was class-based racism, there seems to be no example of a European people that was ever forced into slavery by other Europeans. Class does not appear to me to be the main factor.
Still, here we are in the New World – New York, New Jersey, New Haven. The colonies were what Anderson calls “doubles” of the Old World. Ethnically we were British, French, German, or Spanish. But the distances between Old and New Worlds made holding together far-flung colonies impossible in the long run. When the United States finally penned a Constitution, it was truly something new – something no longer based on European history, or even its own. There was no mention of Columbus, the Mayflower, or Pilgrims – all that came later.
By the 1830’s, however, the new state was a “nation.” It had a piddling history, its genealogies, some founding myths. People were beginning to ponder what their country was and how they belonged. As always, things had to be invented, facts adjusted, to suit the story. In Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn, for example, Huck and Jim’s friendship is portrayed as a friendship of equals – but Jim is also a slave.
After reading Anderson’s book, I came away thinking that he had somewhat haphazardly synthesized the thinking of other authors on nationalism – Elie Kedourie, Ernest Gellner, Eric Hobsbawm, and Anthony Smith. I am particularly fascinated by how nationalism can easily supplant religion. For example, Zionism has largely eclipsed Jewish observance since the Six Day War; and while many Americans no longer take the family to church, they never fail to “support the troops.” In both societies religious militarism is a striking feature (think of the US Air Force Academy or the IDF). And in both there are problems with institutionalized racism – privilege of one ethic group and demonization of another.
But all in all, a useful book to kick off thinking about the anachronistic scourge of nationalism.
