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Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism
01 Jan 1983-
TL;DR: In this paper, Anderson examines the creation and global spread of the 'imagined communities' of nationality and explores the processes that created these communities: the territorialisation of religious faiths, the decline of antique kingship, the interaction between capitalism and print, the development of vernacular languages-of-state, and changing conceptions of time.
Abstract: What makes people love and die for nations, as well as hate and kill in their name? While many studies have been written on nationalist political movements, the sense of nationality - the personal and cultural feeling of belonging to the nation - has not received proportionate attention. In this widely acclaimed work, Benedict Anderson examines the creation and global spread of the 'imagined communities' of nationality. Anderson explores the processes that created these communities: the territorialisation of religious faiths, the decline of antique kingship, the interaction between capitalism and print, the development of vernacular languages-of-state, and changing conceptions of time. He shows how an originary nationalism born in the Americas was modularly adopted by popular movements in Europe, by the imperialist powers, and by the anti-imperialist resistances in Asia and Africa. This revised edition includes two new chapters, one of which discusses the complex role of the colonialist state's mindset in the development of Third World nationalism, while the other analyses the processes by which all over the world, nations came to imagine themselves as old.
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors propose the terms government, non-government and domestic as analytical tools to demarcate discursive and material domains, arguing that the fluidity of boundaries among these spheres is constitutive of patriarchal connectivity, a form of patriarchal kinship linked to the state-building enterprise.
Abstract: The nation/state as an imaginative enterprise encompasses multiple imagined subnational boundaries. The ‘public/private’, I suggest, is a ‘purposeful fiction’ constitutive of the will to statehood. As such, its configurations are impacted upon by the institutions and forces competing with and within state-building enterprises. Proposing the terms government, non-government and domestic as analytical tools to demarcate discursive and material domains, I argue that, in Lebanon, the fluidity of boundaries among these spheres is constitutive of patriarchal connectivity, a form of patriarchal kinship linked to the state-building enterprise.
110 citations
TL;DR: The evolution of thinking on the role of the state, the citizen, and international development management provides clues regarding what works and what research questions remain to be answered as mentioned in this paper. But institutional barriers to cooperation and shared learning need to be overcome, along with tendencies to revert to earlier, simplistic management approaches to solving international development problems.
Abstract: Today’s global concerns with poverty, instability, and terrorism link international development and security in unprecedented ways and assemble new actors in the foreign policy arena. The lessons of past experience need to better inform current policy and practice. The evolution of thinking on the role of the state, the citizen, and international development management provides clues regarding what works and what research questions remain to be answered. Institutional barriers to cooperation and shared learning need to be overcome, along with tendencies to revert to earlier, simplistic management approaches to solving international development problems.
110 citations
TL;DR: The “scientific” project of ethnic classification undertaken for political purposes in Vietnam beginning in 1958 was comparable directly (and not unrelated) to a similar project undertaken in China in the 1950s.
Abstract: On a visit to a northern province in the 1950s, Ho Chi Minh, who had spent many years during the war with the French living with upland peoples in northern Vietnam, asked local authorities how many ethnic groups were found within the province. Professor Đang Nghiem Van, the doyen of ethnologists in Vietnam, has written that President Ho received the following response:The “scientific” project of ethnic classification undertaken for political purposes in Vietnam beginning in 1958 was comparable directly (and not unrelated) to a similar project undertaken in China in the 1950s.
110 citations
01 Jan 2013
TL;DR: To establish a time line and to work on writing the thesis throughout the graduate program will relieve some pressure at the end of the program and to publish at least a part of the thesis, usually as a journal article.
Abstract: Requirements for graduate theses and dissertations are determined by the graduate school and the departmental committee headed by a major advisor under whom a student works. Contents require a report on research usually accompanied by a review of the literature on the subject. In form, traditional theses are written as one entity; other theses may include manuscripts for publication. The student is usually required to defend the contents and quality of the thesis in an oral session before his or her committee. To establish a time line and to work on writing the thesis throughout the graduate program will relieve some pressure at the end of the program. The student may be expected to publish at least a part of the thesis, usually as a journal article.
110 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that current manifestations of populism are offering specific responses to two dilemmas that do not have a clear democratic solution: the boundary problem (how to define the people?) and the limits of self-government.
Abstract: From Hugo Chavez in Venezuela to Geert Wilders in the Netherlands and Sarah Palin in the US, populist leaders claim to offer more power to ‘the people’. However, most scholars argue that populism is in fact a democratic pathology, because it seeks to build a political system devoid of the rule of law. While it is true that populism maintains an ambivalent relationship with liberal democracy, little attention has been paid to the legitimacy of the questions raised by populist forces. Drawing on the work of Robert Dahl, I argue that current manifestations of populism are offering specific responses to two dilemmas that do not have a clear democratic solution: the boundary problem (how to define the people?) and the limits of self-government (how to control the controllers?). My article shows that populist forces are posing legitimate questions about the current state of democracy in Europe and the Americas, although their solutions tend to be more controversial than helpful.
110 citations