Anthony Barnett (Edinburgh, OK): I'm up in Edinburgh where I went to hear Tom Nairn deliver last night's 16th Edinburgh Lecture Globalization and Nationalism: The New Deal? (Republished in openDemocracy.) He was introduced by the government's First Minister Alex Salmond who hosted a reception afterwards. Here is a picture of the two of them, the First Minister is just sitting down after lauding the speaker. I think I need a new camera but it is the only picture there is.
Tom argues that just as the first stage of industrialisation demanded relatively large states so now the new form of globalisation favours small nations. Not because 'small is beautiful'. That is just another form of sizism (which leads what he called "The Body Builders" to scorn small countries). But because for smaller societies "All we can do is our own thing". Unreasonable? It is the only way, he insisted, countries like Scotland can be reasonable. If the British state had offered genuine equity perhaps a democratic federation might have been possible. But by being utterly incapable of reforming itself, Westminster had left Scotland no alternative - and the global forces at work support self-government without the 'ism'. A point Salmond saluted in his concluding remarks. For Tom agrees that chauvinism as we have known it, ie great nation nationalism that began in the 1860s, is on the way out:
Yes, possibly blood is draining out of the '-ism'; but not out of nationalities, identities, cultural contrasts, and the wish (or the determination) to have, or to win, different forms of collective 'say' in the brave new globe.
PS: for later press coverage and links see here
Comments
So lets get on with doing our own thing together in Confederation. Liberty, equality, humanity.
Nairn more or less skips over the biggest winners from globalisation, China and India. If they were to fragment into two hundred smaller states apiece, would they do even better?
An interesting view which gets my sympathy but also doubts. Some if not all of the splits proposed (e.g., Kosovo) are based on differences of superstition and cause division and conflict we could do without (Indeed SHOULD do without).
The "viability" argument may or may not apply, but cases such as the above have led to censorship attempts (Rushdie) and even war (Bosnia, Pakistan).
The difficulty for me is the complete absence of any discussion of the most decisive force in determining where, and how, we live and organise ourselves in future - anthropogenic climate change.
A hypothesis may be that small states like Scotland, with ample renewable energy, could indeed become independent (despite the loss of substantial landmass to sea level rise!). But the Scottish human disapora, like many others, will be adversely affected by social and economic sanctions against long distance travel by current favoured means (because of emissions) and an inevitable 'localisation' of economies.
So far I see little connecting theories of nationalism to future climate change impacts, which transcend the nation state. My general understanding of the issue would be that small states can prosper in a warmer world (as Denmark will), but only when endowed with sufficient resources and technological clout ('adaptive capacity' as some call it). But the issue of rising CO2 emissions effectively puts all bets about 'globalisation' and its success on hold - political theorists seem strangely divorced from the very urgent debates going on about the anthropocene and its legacy.
Post new comment