Page 42 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

nation-state 1343

Good judgment comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgment. • Fred Brooks

italist elites in these newly industrialized societies grad- national order based upon the European balance of
ually undermined the classical liberal principles of free power; indeed, they were opposed to formal imperial-
trade—enabling and enabled by British hegemony—by ism. Both Lenin and Woodrow Wilson were committed
adopting policies to secure a state-protected national to national self-determination; when the Czarist empire
economy. The two world wars of the twentieth century was reconstituted as the Union of the Soviet Socialist
were significantly driven by emergent nation-states in the Republics, the constituent parts were theoretically autono-
competition for global resources. mous socialist nationalities.The anti-imperialist outlook
Equally important was the mobilization of human was undergirded ideologically by the discrediting of the
resources by the nation-state in the name of the nation. “civilizing mission” of the imperialist powers. Horrified
Nationalism was deployed to rally the population and by the scale of devastation of World War I, intellectuals
resources for imperialist expansion and war. Mass organ- both in the West and in the colonial world launched a
izations created by the nation-state to mobilize civilian critique of the Western ideal of civilization, which in the
support for war were first developed by Japan, the Soviet light of the war they felt had forfeited the right to repre-
Union, and Italy, nations that were not principals in sent the highest goals or ultimate values of humanity.
World War I but that observed the insufficiency of civil- Colonial intellectuals and leaders in places such as
ian support during the war.These government sponsored China, India, and the Islamic world began to look to
mass organizations, such as the Military Reservists Asso- their own civilizations’ traditions to sanction their emer-
ciation formed in Japan in 1910, were developed along gent national movements.
the model of a conscript army, imbued with nationalism, The period after World War I witnessed both the ex-
and were elevated rhetorically to represent the will of the pansion of the nation-state system and the growth of
people. In this way the government would call on the nationalism. While it was hoped that bringing more
people to transcend immediate and particular interests; states under the regulatory mechanisms of the system,
it might, for example, ask people to forego personal con- such as the League of Nations, would solve the problem
sumption or it might call into question the legitimacy of of wars among nations, the inherent contradictions in
striking workers within the nation. Empire became the the system actually appeared to intensify. On the one
reward and glory of mass nationalism. hand, more nation-states and even colonies such as
The events that concluded World War I established the India and mandated territories in the Middle East were
normative principle that the world should be divided part of the League of Nations; one the other hand, bur-
into nation-states and dealt an important though by no geoning nationalism justified aggression and domination.
means conclusive blow to imperialism. The Paris Peace Older imperialist nations, faced with the growing phe-
Conference of 1919, the Soviet Revolution, the break-up nomenon of nationalism, had to find alternatives to for-
of the Ottoman and Hapsburg empires into nation- mal colonialism in order to control resources and remain
states, and the establishment of the League of Nations in globally competitive. Sometimes this meant developing
1920 reflected a vision of the world in which the bound- client states and other subordinate political forms instead
aries of the state coincided with that of language and of colonies. Rising nation-states such as Germany, Italy,
nationality. The creators of the League imagined the and Japan intensified their pursuit of economic and
League as a forum for internationalism based upon co- political supremacy, particularly during the Great Depres-
operation among nations—the individual families of sion.The League of Nations turned out to have no teeth
mankind.Two other factors following the war have to be and could not enforce compliance upon those who
noted: the changed balance of power in the world and brazenly violated its covenant, such as Italy and Japan. In
the advent of a new discourse of anti-imperialism. part, this was because it was dominated by imperialist
The Soviet Union and the United States of America nation-states who themselves continued to possess col-
emerged as new powers with little stake in the old inter- onies and special privileges.The League ultimately failed