Historical Background
Introduction
The subject of nationalism has recently been seen on the rise among the scholar groups due to its popular emergence around the globe where it shows the practice and implementation of the core ideology and the various derivatives. Nationalism, as the political ideology, has been considered to be a dying concept time and again in history. However, it has revived due to the relevance of the notion that its practice has been modified by various political parties to intrigue among the general public the sense of belonging to the concept which connects them and revives the formation of collective belonging. The meaning, as well as the practice, along with its implementation, is dependent on the term ‘nation’ and its political connotation (Ahlerup and Hansson 2011). The essence which makes the subject a distinguished one is a consistent inconsistency in the ideological conception which is associated with them. The term in recent time also shows affinity to the display of populism that connects the popular expectation and acceptance from the nationalist propagandist. The structure of the formation of the likelihood of implementation can be seen bearing dependency on people which forms the outline for the form of nationalism which is applied. The difference in the form of nationalism can be seen with the example of two of the biggest contenders of democracy India and America and how nationalism is associated with religion and culture in the first and with ethnicity in the second. It leads to the reflection that derivative which is followed is dependent on the nation, which again has variances (Antonsich and Skey 2017). The essay aims to investigate how the conceptual change in the ideological meaning associated with the political agendas and the social entities used shapes the way nationalism is implemented across the world. The essay will also seek to collect the data which reveals the nationalism has always been used for the political exhaustion rather than for the people as is claimed in the nations which claim to associate false significance to the concept in order to convey the image that the social policies are nationalist.
Establishing the ideologies through the geopolitical play of the term can be understood, one must first understand the different forms of nations and the very basis of the importance of term can be understood. The fragmentation of the global sphere into governable and claimable geographical location led to the formation of states that can be seen in the several social entities whose presence has been normalised to the extent that they have become invisible to the eyes of the society which is unaware of the legality and the executive function of their presence. The first derivative of the nation can be understood in the form of the attachment which is created that marks its specification and is deliberately associated with the emotional relevance which depends on the social trend of the state. The concept of the national entities such as that of the national border, national animal, national anthem, national flag and the list goes on revealing the concealed and the forgotten nationalist notions present in daily life (Paasi 2016). This notion has, however, become a consistent symbolisation of marking the object with the authoritative form of structural ownership. The second derivation of the nation is seen to be formed in adherence to the cultural entity which is connected with the identity of the populating inhabiting inside the geographical location under a single form of governance that is race and religion. The concept of the European nations and the Asian nations and among them Whites and the coloured and in case of the religion, the emergence of the Hindu Rashtra (Nation) and the Non-Hindus shows the use of an extremely intimate variable in the political sphere. Hence, the term nation can be generally defined as the geographical location and the people living in it and sharing ancestry, which generates in them the sense of community and is under a specified form of government.
Forms of Nation and Importance of the term
As established above, the difference in the ideological acceptance of the term alludes to the meaning of nationalism which is different for a different nation. Nationalism, as the core concept, is often accepted as a tool in nation-building. Nation-building can be understood with the help of the social dictums mentioned above, such as the national border and the national flag, which gives birth to the emotion generating the sense of identity among the population. This construct is later is used to display and identity the nation which is imbued on the object. However, when it comes to the population, they are attached more intimately by providing them with the status of having gained citizenship or having been the citizen of the nation since birth. According to Ahlerup and Hansson, nation-building structure of nationalism helped in the expression of ‘national identity’. The concept of national identity has become one of the major sources of conflict around the world where the changing notion of nationalism has been observed to be different and deviating from the actual concept. It is explained by Bieber under the different form of nationalism such as that of latent nationalism and banal nationalism which is seen as the most prominent forms in the current political scenarios (Bieber 2018).
The national identity has become a source of conflict because of the division in the practice of nationalism where the latent form follows an implementation approach where the symbols are used to assert the power and make the nation follow it under the notion of nationalism. While banal nationalism which is also considered as a toxic form and is criticised due to its overuse of the association to display the power and the identity of the land as above in the hierarchal table of importance than individuals themselves. Its practice is seen to establish the concept of one and ‘other’ in the collective term where nationalism takes the status of something more than a political ideology. It is turned into political ethics which takes the agents of nationalism to foster what the essence of civic nationalism as the root of the narratives, which is played as the nation-building. The wave which has been seen as the rise in nationalism around the democratic, as well as republic government around the world, cannot be seen as the rise in it simply in its assertion and promotion by the combination of modern agents of media, celebrity culture and the traditional support of the cultural elites and of course the representation of the hyperactive sense of belonging and symbolising the welfare of the nation as the highest form of recognition in the formation of social policies by the political parties supporting them. They turn the social entity of the individual identity structure such as religion, ethnicity as well as race and colour of an individual to associate them to the nation of dissociating them from it. The civic component of the determination of citizenship is one of the major forms of ideological as well as legal enforcement which is used in around the term nationalism to reap the benefit of collective identity. The Indian example of what is now known as hyper-nationalism or in the political term banal nationalism, there has been a display of assertion and search of national identity based on an ethnic identity that is the religion of individuals. Whereas, the blatant increase in xenophobia around the world has been incorporated into political strategy and used as political agendas. For example, in case of Donald Trump, his display of plain and simple hatred for the coloured population which he uses to deem them a migrant and push to send them back to their native country has increased vehemently.
Difference in Meaning of Nationalism Across Different Nations
The concept of a native country is linked closely to the nation and national border within which the presence of the ancestor is related. An individual born within the national boundaries was the marker which determined the birthplace of an individual, but it has again been turned into what is now called ethnic nationalism. It is one of the crudest forms, which is being observed in working around the world the ethnic identity is combined with civic nationalism to levy the social policies of inclusion and exclusion (Modongal 2016). The social policies such as that in France has been given the status of national law which has been used to establish the adherence, preference and acceptance from the governments one of the markers. The Muslims and their religious identities were first questioned. Then the social play was put to work where the majority of the populace, which is a non-muslim started displaying a ground of intolerance towards the. It started with the portrayal of the media where they showed the community in the light of being an outsider and the growing intolerance, which resulted in violence (Barrington 1997). It later was turned into a political issue when the nationalist government decided to use it as the agent where their sense of dressing was the first thing to be attacked.
The ethnic variant of religion is seen under the microscope of dressing that is the cover known as the hijab was banned by the government itself, which emanated the sense of lack of nativism among them. The French Muslims were no longer identified as individuals but were recognised by their attire and were marked as the violator of the political stance of the nation. Their identity was utilised and turned into what can be termed as the expression of the representative of nationalism as the exclusivity virulent (Szulc 2017). The second agent is also based on the assertion of role descent, which is seen as the forbearer of nationalism for people having an identity with national social acceptance towards a religion. The status of being a secondary religion in the nation shows how the French Muslims were put in the dynamic structure where they were ideologically expected by the others to accept the national policies even if it encroached their personal choice of eating, dressing and praying within the legal definition. Any deviation is seen as acting against the nation and hence were seen used as the validation for marginalisation and the marginalised treatment meted out to them.
Nationalism and Nation Building
The subordination or the othering based on the civic entity is used in the United States, which has a better association when it is addressed as the United Nations. Whether it is in case of nationalism which shows political adherence or the working of the ethnic entrepreneurs, it is observed that the role of the media works as the heavier mechanism with the role of traditional elite support which grants the allegiance to the national parties (Verheul 2012). It shows how nationalism is not an inborn sense which can emerge on its own or can even sustain on its own. Rather it requires the support of populism which is more variable an ideology than nationalism and but is more useful when it comes to the assertion of it. The collectivity which is associated with the ideology is the misuse of the term contradictory to the previous use of the term used in countries like South Africa and India during and after independence.
In the Indian fight for independence, the Nationalist party which represented the fight from the native side to show their assertion of the fact that they were the native and the origin of the nation was the Indian National Congress. The term national attached to it made the people in the society associate with the cause of the party. However, we can observe the virulent which were utilised to foster the feelings of ownership of the land surface and the desire to be ruled and governed by their own. After the independence, the nation-building approaches shows that the first social and cultural agents that were added to strengthen the nationalist essence which was fresh then was the establishment of the Indian national symbol that was the emblem with four lions and the unfurling of the national flag along with the national anthem written by the native of the nation. However, the nationalism which is seen to be prevalent in the Indian subcontinent from the past six years with the establishment of government under the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) which has the support and is considered to be an extension of a Hindu nationalist volunteer organisation Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) is considered to be largely in contradiction to the nationalism which was utilised to achieve independence.
The representative or the face of the nationalist propaganda run by BJP is the Home Minister of the largest democracy in the world, Amit Shah and the political head of the country, the Prime Minister of India since 2014 Narendra Damodardas Modi. India is the land of multiple culture and diversity in the religion has always been subjected to the divisive policies which have been based on the ethnic symbolisation of the religion which has the majority and the second largest religious community of Muslims. Before 2014, during the campaign, it was not only the religious factor, but it was an appeal towards the intellectual and the use of the national language by the then campaigning Modi of Hindi and his skill to depict himself and the motive of his party to be completely and solely dependent on the nationalist attitude. According to Bieber, one of the measuring evidence which can be used to see the change in the concept of nationalism is the violence and hate crime (Bieber 2018). The Indian government formed for the second time in 2019 with an even bigger majority than 2014 showed the affirmation of the misuse of the nationalism ideology with the use of the civic nationalism virulent of citizenship (Harriss, Corbridge and Jeffrey 2017). The banal nationalism notion which has been condition into the mind of the majority of the population has become a tool for hate crimes which were seen in during the first office period of Modi where Muslims and their choice of meat was the main focus of attention which was associated with the violation of the Hindu laws where they see cows as symbolic presence of the goddess or mother (Gau Mata as they call it) due to which its killings started to show communal face (Harriss, Corbridge and Jeffrey 2017).
Different Forms of Nationalism and its Implementation
The public face or as explained above nationalism cannot sustain on its own, it needs to be fed consistently which was done by local BJP ministers and violence became the only option to assert the ban on beef forcefully in most of the states within the nation. Establishing the concept with banal nationalism can be understood with the fact that it was not just the ignorant population of the nation which asserted this but was also displayed accepted by the leaders and the ministers and the violence was even encouraged by them (Safdar and Mushtaq 2019). The banality of the situation arises that the nation and the government which supported the majority religion in its belief by banning the consumption of beef within their country but the same government became the largest exporter to beef. The second and the most important virulent was the change in the attitude of the population where the political party did not remain as the server as should be the case in democracy but became the ultimate representation of their nationalism, and any voice of criticism and resentment was dealt attitude of being offended (Skey 2018). The change in the Indian media is the most visible one since any, and every voice which showed their deviation from praising and justifying the working or any social policies were sacked and even saw the extent of a women journalist who was one of the strongest criticisers of Modi’s communal ministers was shot on her door. The situation in India shows affinity to the banal nationalism being in the ‘bad’ category of nationalism (Brown 1999).
In the case of the US, the era of Barrack Obama saw a huge change in the attitude with the hope of the people of colour being accepted in the structural face of the nation (Tavares 2016). However, Trump and his open hatred and the intentional ignorance of his racism in his official speech saw a spike in hate crimes where white supremacy rose to its prime (Brown 1999). With the very recent case of George Floyd where the video of the police officer in uniform in the state of Minneapolis killed him by choking him with his knee on the road with another officer standing on guard for the murderer shows the embedded nationalist approach which shows exclusion of the African American and the entitlement which is flaunted by the officers of their cultural identity of being superior and consideration of the African individuals as not being a native (B. Waxman 2020). It can be compared to the popular culture of patriotism which is advertised and supported by the media and the elite groups and even social media to generate and propagate the idea of nationalism to be placed and accepted above their individual and other’s ethnic identity.
Rise of Nationalism in Democratic and Republic Governments
Conclusion
In conclusion, the essay shows the intentional modification which is done to achieve political propagandas as it has been observed that people associated with the nation more the term state due to his connection with nationalism. Furthermore, the cultural symbols of nationalism which promoted banal nationalism such as that of the national language and national flag could be used to generate a false sense. Hence, the use of the term nationalism is not a new trend but the growth of populism where each government around the world tends to draw on the civic entity of citizenship showing how the concept could be modified and used to marginalise a community to gain control over them. Even though nationalism is not a new ideology, its misuse in the range and nations which are representative of democracy is alarming as the factor of social communication and intellectuals are turned into mere tools to puzzle the crowd rather than providing a clear view (Antonsich and Skey 2017). The rise in hate crime and political violence in both the countries observed is the biggest example of the danger. The essay shows how populism makes banal nationalism an economical means for the political party where modern atrocities are validated under social policies. As the United Nation stands as the biggest economic and social influencer, its changing narrative of nationalism can be to affect in the global sphere.
References
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