For the longest time I was opposing nationalism and the concept of citizenship. I researched the issue, read and crafted arguments in favour of my position and convinced myself that this is a rational opinion to have. Then some things happened that made me feel more connected to the soil I was born on. Still I feel that my identity is not determined by my passport but my previous arguments seem a whole lot less convincing and the arguments I dismissed as unreasonable seem more convincing.
The quest to be more rational is one of the more humbling things I ever did with the hardest lesson to learn being that I am wrong very often and my beliefs are largely not rational.
Maybe the risk is in trying to argue for our positions more strongly than we actually feel them. More extreme positions feel higher-status… but then comes the moment when one realizes “oops, I actually don’t feel this”, and the pendulum swings to the opposite direction.
Sometimes we are pushed to an extreme position by people who argue for the opposite extreme position. They keep giving arguments for one side… and to argue with them, we focus on the arguments for the other side.
Of course we shouldn’t underestimate the impact of peer pressure. But that’s a bad reason to change opinions. On the other hand, realizing that one’s position isn’t truly as extreme as it seemed originally, and updating towards the true position, that is a good reason.
The term “nationalism” is used in at least two very different ways. The particularist use is more accurately termed “national chauvinism”, usually but not always ethnically-based, is the idea that one’s own nation is in some way better than all the others, and the interests of its people should be accorded disproportionate weight. Note that this kind of nationalist doesn’t necessarily care about political organization outside of his own country; he has an ideology about his nation, not necessarily about nations in general.
I would agree that used in this sense, “nationalism” is basically indefensible.
There is a different, generalist use of the term “nationalism,” however, which traces academically to people like Ernest Gellner, and philosophically, arguably back to people like Friedrich List. Nationalism in this sense, is merely the proposition, “National boundaries should coincide with state boundaries.” Importantly, it doesn’t require ethnically-defined nations, merely people who self-identify as being part of a common national community, whether that be based on blood, culture, or something else. A natural corollary of this view of nations and nationalism is that, at least in the world as it actually exists now, everyone is either a nationalist or an imperialist (one could carve out a small exception for anarchists).
In this generalist sense of “nationalism,” which makes claims not about “my nation” but about “all nations,” I think there are tradeoffs on both sides. I identify as an somewhat ambivalent nationalist. But unlike the the first sense, I don’t think you can argue that the nationalist position is prima facie inferior from a consequentialist standpoint.
The particularist use is more accurately termed “national chauvinism”, usually but not always ethnically-based, is the idea that one’s own nation is in some way better than all the others, and the interests of its people should be accorded disproportionate weight.
The “in some way better than all others” bit isn’t a very charitable reading of that position; if a Frenchman wants the french government to further the interests of France and Frenchmen (even at the expense of other countries), then it’s a form of nationalism but doesn’t include a belief that “France is better than the rest”; it’s only that he cares more about France than about the rest.
Having diminishing “circles of empathy” for others depending on whether they’re in your family, your city, your country, your religion or race etc. is pretty normal, but there’s variance about what levels are considered as more important; (pretty much) everybody cares more about their family, but some may see religion or political affiliation or their city as a “more important” identity than one’s country (this is assuming country = nation, which as you say is usually the case in the West now); “national chauvinists” would be the ones who put their country above other identities.
Neither arguments nor evidence. That is the exact point of my post.
But to answer a more lenient reading of your request: After making an effort to be less hostile to group celebrations, people in general and local cultures and traditions I could relax enough to take part in those and/or enjoy them. As a result I both feel more belonging to the country I live in and also I appreciate other cultures and cultural traditions more.
From your description it appears you have gained a stronger connection with your local culture and empathy for those of other cultures who strive to preserve theirs, but I don’t see the line linking that with political support for nation-states.
Now you made me want to make a rational argument for nationalism. Uhm… let’s try this:
Imagine that some cultures do things that you consider horrible (e.g. genital mutilation, “honor” killing, killing people for blasphemy or sexual orientation, etc.). Your culture doesn’t do that. However, for some reasons, the populations in the other cultures are growing, the population in your culture is not, people immigrate to your country and bring their horrible behavior with them. You are afraid that unless something is done against this, the repulsive behavior will become a norm in your country, too. Maybe not the majority norm, but still something that is more or less tolerated, because no mainstream politician would risk making too many voters angry. How to stop this?
Appealing to national feelings may be a realistic strategy. (The point is not to invent something that intellectuals would agree with, but something that has a realistic chance to get a popular support.) You can try to make people more proud of your local culture, and emphasise that not doing X is an important part of what makes this country great. Thus you get a strong political force against X.
Related: “Use Your Identity Carefully”. -- My analogy is that nationalism is identity on the mass level (identity for NPCs?). It is a tool to preserve a group of memes, both good and bad. Instead of throwing away the tool, you can try to increase the proportion of the good memes in the mix.
Having a strong national identity, and norms around self-sacrifice in favor of “The Fatherland” seems like pretty good instrumental rationality, in terms of coordination, enforcing cooperation, economies of scale, etc. “Identity for NPCs” sounds a bit dismissive for a mechanism that works pretty well (to me it sounds close to “cooperating is for suckers, rationalists should defect”).
I don’t think “rejecting weird foreign norms” has much to do with the historical causes of nationalist sentiment; I’d say it had more to do with enforcing strong norms over weak norms (for example, speaking the same language, not engaging in nepotism, obeying the law, sending your children to school, taking up arms to defend the country), and putting the primary focus of loyalty on the country (and not the king, the church, your family or your village). Foreigners from far away with different norms is a more recent phenomenon.
“Identity for NPCs” sounds a bit dismissive for a mechanism that works pretty well (to me it sounds close to “cooperating is for suckers, rationalists should defect”).
Oh. Uhm, if we put it to the Prisonner’s Dilemma language, I’d rather say—rational people can analyze the situation and choose with whom to cooperate even if the other person is different, but stupid people need some simple and safe algorithm, such as: “cooperate with identical copies of myself, defect against everyone else”.
Which works decently, if you have many identical copies at the same place, interacting mostly with each other. You cannot be exploited by someone using a smart algorithm. That’s a relatively impressive outcome for such a simple algorithm.
The disadvantage is that you can’t cooperate even with people using functionally identical algorithms with different group markers (e.g. using a different language, or dressing differently). And you have to suppress your deviations from the official norm (e.g. a minority sexual orientation). And you have a barrier to self-improvement, because the improved version is by definition different than the original one. -- On the other hand, if you manage to somehow artificially impose some positive change on everyone at the same time (or very slowly during a long time period), then the positive change will be preserved. Unfortunately, it works the same way with negative changes.
Oh. Uhm, if we put it to the Prisonner’s Dilemma language, I’d rather say—rational people can analyze the situation and choose with whom to cooperate even if the other person is different, but stupid people need some simple and safe algorithm, such as: “cooperate with identical copies of myself, defect against everyone else”.
It’s not clear that someone analyzing the situation will choose to cooperate—plenty of smart people have argued that the rational behavior in prisoner’s dilemma is to defect.
And I would argue that even for smart people, a simple algorithm is more likely to get everyone on board; a complicated but “better” solution which no one else follows (and that would only count as “better” if everybody was following it) is not worth following.
That’s certainly one, but there’s an even easier argument to make—Burkean conservatism. Your nation’s identity is built around stuff that’s probably worked pretty well for it in past(or else it probably wouldn’t be a nation today). As such, it’s got a higher prior probability of working out in your local circumstances. It’s not a large effect, of course, but it’s a real one, particularly for successful nations.
Imagine that some cultures do things that you consider horrible (e.g. genital mutilation, “honor” killing, killing people for blasphemy or sexual orientation, etc.). Your culture doesn’t do that.
But my culture also does things that I consider horrible that other cultures don’t do! (SCNR.)
I think your thought process is indicative of our modern age. It is hard to concept of nations in the online environment that, at least for the time being, remains borderless. Nationalism has produced 2 world wars and several smaller conflicts and given its impetus in 1648 as a way of allowing kingdoms and countries to decide their religion without outside influence I think the 21st century will see fewer borders rather than more borders. That being said a quick read of any news site would make that statement hard to believe as nations get more nationalistic. However, advances in communication, transportation, and the movement of good, services, capital, and people will make borders less and less meaningless. What is a nation? What is geographical area? What is a political border? Our economy and our way of working is reducing that meaning. 30 years ago your country was the sum total of your upbringing, language, culture, shared values, and chances in life. Movement was long and hard and fraught with difficulty. That is becoming far less in our modern age. I think we all will feel tied to where we were born and grew up because its comfortable, its homey, we know the back routes, we know the cultural rules and being tribal as humans are we generally fit into that tribe. Those are all important things. Your personal identity is never, nor has it ever been tied to a passport. It is just a little book that tells other countries where you are coming from and some information about you. It is not you, it a part of you that is on paper for movement purposes. The lesson in life that you are more often than not wrong is nothing to be afraid of or anything to cause you distress but rather you are finding the juicy part of the human existence.
That being said a quick read of any news site would make that statement hard to believe as nations get more nationalistic.
News sites don’t provide much evidence of increase of nationalist sentiment, unless you take into account the usual spin anytime something bad is reported: “This bad thing happened! Things are getting worse!”
Yes, however the desire for Colorado to split into two states for California to split into 6 and for the ukraine to split into 2 I think shows that there is a identity/policy crisis going on that is compelling political entities to split. Although one does have to dig past the hype these news sites have their use.
Right! Therefore I think its helpful to think about the institution of the nation state and how to govern ourselves as a political entity rather than forfeiting that right to others. Does the nation state concept still have meaning or is it time for a change?
Haidt calls this pushing your “hive-switch” (humans are “90% chimp, 10% bee”).You can reliably increase your groupishness by simulating your in-group being under attack or by taking certain kinds of drugs.
Note that Haidt’s theory relies on group selection, which many people on LW disagree with. From reading this essay by Pinker and the replies by Haidt and others, the whole thing seems complicated.
Be careful what you argue for.
For the longest time I was opposing nationalism and the concept of citizenship. I researched the issue, read and crafted arguments in favour of my position and convinced myself that this is a rational opinion to have. Then some things happened that made me feel more connected to the soil I was born on. Still I feel that my identity is not determined by my passport but my previous arguments seem a whole lot less convincing and the arguments I dismissed as unreasonable seem more convincing.
The quest to be more rational is one of the more humbling things I ever did with the hardest lesson to learn being that I am wrong very often and my beliefs are largely not rational.
Maybe the risk is in trying to argue for our positions more strongly than we actually feel them. More extreme positions feel higher-status… but then comes the moment when one realizes “oops, I actually don’t feel this”, and the pendulum swings to the opposite direction.
Sometimes we are pushed to an extreme position by people who argue for the opposite extreme position. They keep giving arguments for one side… and to argue with them, we focus on the arguments for the other side.
Of course we shouldn’t underestimate the impact of peer pressure. But that’s a bad reason to change opinions. On the other hand, realizing that one’s position isn’t truly as extreme as it seemed originally, and updating towards the true position, that is a good reason.
As a fervent anti-nationalist, I’m very curious as to what arguments and/or evidence made you change your mind.
The term “nationalism” is used in at least two very different ways. The particularist use is more accurately termed “national chauvinism”, usually but not always ethnically-based, is the idea that one’s own nation is in some way better than all the others, and the interests of its people should be accorded disproportionate weight. Note that this kind of nationalist doesn’t necessarily care about political organization outside of his own country; he has an ideology about his nation, not necessarily about nations in general.
I would agree that used in this sense, “nationalism” is basically indefensible.
There is a different, generalist use of the term “nationalism,” however, which traces academically to people like Ernest Gellner, and philosophically, arguably back to people like Friedrich List. Nationalism in this sense, is merely the proposition, “National boundaries should coincide with state boundaries.” Importantly, it doesn’t require ethnically-defined nations, merely people who self-identify as being part of a common national community, whether that be based on blood, culture, or something else. A natural corollary of this view of nations and nationalism is that, at least in the world as it actually exists now, everyone is either a nationalist or an imperialist (one could carve out a small exception for anarchists).
In this generalist sense of “nationalism,” which makes claims not about “my nation” but about “all nations,” I think there are tradeoffs on both sides. I identify as an somewhat ambivalent nationalist. But unlike the the first sense, I don’t think you can argue that the nationalist position is prima facie inferior from a consequentialist standpoint.
The “in some way better than all others” bit isn’t a very charitable reading of that position; if a Frenchman wants the french government to further the interests of France and Frenchmen (even at the expense of other countries), then it’s a form of nationalism but doesn’t include a belief that “France is better than the rest”; it’s only that he cares more about France than about the rest.
Having diminishing “circles of empathy” for others depending on whether they’re in your family, your city, your country, your religion or race etc. is pretty normal, but there’s variance about what levels are considered as more important; (pretty much) everybody cares more about their family, but some may see religion or political affiliation or their city as a “more important” identity than one’s country (this is assuming country = nation, which as you say is usually the case in the West now); “national chauvinists” would be the ones who put their country above other identities.
This BTW is my beef with Mencius Moldbug when he points out that German nationalism is considered bad and Czech nationalism is considered good.
Neither arguments nor evidence. That is the exact point of my post.
But to answer a more lenient reading of your request: After making an effort to be less hostile to group celebrations, people in general and local cultures and traditions I could relax enough to take part in those and/or enjoy them. As a result I both feel more belonging to the country I live in and also I appreciate other cultures and cultural traditions more.
Does that answer your question?
From your description it appears you have gained a stronger connection with your local culture and empathy for those of other cultures who strive to preserve theirs, but I don’t see the line linking that with political support for nation-states.
There is none, that is the whole point.
Apparently you don´t need a argument to be a nationalist. Guess this is just system 1 working.
Now you made me want to make a rational argument for nationalism. Uhm… let’s try this:
Imagine that some cultures do things that you consider horrible (e.g. genital mutilation, “honor” killing, killing people for blasphemy or sexual orientation, etc.). Your culture doesn’t do that. However, for some reasons, the populations in the other cultures are growing, the population in your culture is not, people immigrate to your country and bring their horrible behavior with them. You are afraid that unless something is done against this, the repulsive behavior will become a norm in your country, too. Maybe not the majority norm, but still something that is more or less tolerated, because no mainstream politician would risk making too many voters angry. How to stop this?
Appealing to national feelings may be a realistic strategy. (The point is not to invent something that intellectuals would agree with, but something that has a realistic chance to get a popular support.) You can try to make people more proud of your local culture, and emphasise that not doing X is an important part of what makes this country great. Thus you get a strong political force against X.
Related: “Use Your Identity Carefully”. -- My analogy is that nationalism is identity on the mass level (identity for NPCs?). It is a tool to preserve a group of memes, both good and bad. Instead of throwing away the tool, you can try to increase the proportion of the good memes in the mix.
Having a strong national identity, and norms around self-sacrifice in favor of “The Fatherland” seems like pretty good instrumental rationality, in terms of coordination, enforcing cooperation, economies of scale, etc. “Identity for NPCs” sounds a bit dismissive for a mechanism that works pretty well (to me it sounds close to “cooperating is for suckers, rationalists should defect”).
I don’t think “rejecting weird foreign norms” has much to do with the historical causes of nationalist sentiment; I’d say it had more to do with enforcing strong norms over weak norms (for example, speaking the same language, not engaging in nepotism, obeying the law, sending your children to school, taking up arms to defend the country), and putting the primary focus of loyalty on the country (and not the king, the church, your family or your village). Foreigners from far away with different norms is a more recent phenomenon.
Oh. Uhm, if we put it to the Prisonner’s Dilemma language, I’d rather say—rational people can analyze the situation and choose with whom to cooperate even if the other person is different, but stupid people need some simple and safe algorithm, such as: “cooperate with identical copies of myself, defect against everyone else”.
Which works decently, if you have many identical copies at the same place, interacting mostly with each other. You cannot be exploited by someone using a smart algorithm. That’s a relatively impressive outcome for such a simple algorithm.
The disadvantage is that you can’t cooperate even with people using functionally identical algorithms with different group markers (e.g. using a different language, or dressing differently). And you have to suppress your deviations from the official norm (e.g. a minority sexual orientation). And you have a barrier to self-improvement, because the improved version is by definition different than the original one. -- On the other hand, if you manage to somehow artificially impose some positive change on everyone at the same time (or very slowly during a long time period), then the positive change will be preserved. Unfortunately, it works the same way with negative changes.
It’s not clear that someone analyzing the situation will choose to cooperate—plenty of smart people have argued that the rational behavior in prisoner’s dilemma is to defect.
And I would argue that even for smart people, a simple algorithm is more likely to get everyone on board; a complicated but “better” solution which no one else follows (and that would only count as “better” if everybody was following it) is not worth following.
That’s certainly one, but there’s an even easier argument to make—Burkean conservatism. Your nation’s identity is built around stuff that’s probably worked pretty well for it in past(or else it probably wouldn’t be a nation today). As such, it’s got a higher prior probability of working out in your local circumstances. It’s not a large effect, of course, but it’s a real one, particularly for successful nations.
But my culture also does things that I consider horrible that other cultures don’t do! (SCNR.)
Also, the bad things my culture does are “near” (both metaphorically and geographically), and the bad things other cultures do are “far”.
Which I guess is why I am not a nationalist.
But I can imagine a situation that could change it, such as seeing a foreign minority doing their horrible stuff in my neigborhood.
Does your definition of nationality include language and cultural identity? Do you think it’s possible to separate the two?
I think your thought process is indicative of our modern age. It is hard to concept of nations in the online environment that, at least for the time being, remains borderless. Nationalism has produced 2 world wars and several smaller conflicts and given its impetus in 1648 as a way of allowing kingdoms and countries to decide their religion without outside influence I think the 21st century will see fewer borders rather than more borders. That being said a quick read of any news site would make that statement hard to believe as nations get more nationalistic. However, advances in communication, transportation, and the movement of good, services, capital, and people will make borders less and less meaningless. What is a nation? What is geographical area? What is a political border? Our economy and our way of working is reducing that meaning. 30 years ago your country was the sum total of your upbringing, language, culture, shared values, and chances in life. Movement was long and hard and fraught with difficulty. That is becoming far less in our modern age. I think we all will feel tied to where we were born and grew up because its comfortable, its homey, we know the back routes, we know the cultural rules and being tribal as humans are we generally fit into that tribe. Those are all important things. Your personal identity is never, nor has it ever been tied to a passport. It is just a little book that tells other countries where you are coming from and some information about you. It is not you, it a part of you that is on paper for movement purposes. The lesson in life that you are more often than not wrong is nothing to be afraid of or anything to cause you distress but rather you are finding the juicy part of the human existence.
News sites don’t provide much evidence of increase of nationalist sentiment, unless you take into account the usual spin anytime something bad is reported: “This bad thing happened! Things are getting worse!”
Yes, however the desire for Colorado to split into two states for California to split into 6 and for the ukraine to split into 2 I think shows that there is a identity/policy crisis going on that is compelling political entities to split. Although one does have to dig past the hype these news sites have their use.
Part of it is that different parts of the states have different ideas about how the state should be governed.
Right! Therefore I think its helpful to think about the institution of the nation state and how to govern ourselves as a political entity rather than forfeiting that right to others. Does the nation state concept still have meaning or is it time for a change?
Haidt calls this pushing your “hive-switch” (humans are “90% chimp, 10% bee”).You can reliably increase your groupishness by simulating your in-group being under attack or by taking certain kinds of drugs.
Note that Haidt’s theory relies on group selection, which many people on LW disagree with. From reading this essay by Pinker and the replies by Haidt and others, the whole thing seems complicated.