On a Methodological Reboot of the Theory of Nations

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This article is the republished version of:

On a Methodological Reboot of the Theory of Nations

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English translation © 2017 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC, from the Russian text © 2017 “Gefter.ru.” “O metodologicheskoi perezagruzke teorii natsii,” Gefter.ru, May 10, 2017, http://gefter.ru/archive/22113.

Emil’ Pain is Professor of Political Science at the National Research University–Higher School of Economics in Moscow. Sergei Fediunin is a PhD student at the National Institute of Eastern Languages and Civilizations (Paris).

Translated by Lucy Gunderson. Translation reprinted from Russian Politics and Law, vol. 56, no. 1-2. DOI: 10.1080/10611940.2018.1686920.

1. A. Kazantsev and V. Kravtsov. “Sovremennyi konstruktivizm. Dva suzhdeniia ob odnoi metodologii,” www.gefter.ru, December 14, 2016 (available at http://gefter.ru/archive/20402).

2. D.C. North, “Institutions,” Journal of Economic Perspectives, 1991, vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 97–122.

3. “Ischerpannoe vremia postmoderna. Interv’iu s Liliei Shevtsovoi,” Radio Svoboda, January 21, 2017 (available at http://www.svoboda.org/a/28243845.html).

4. For the most recent publications, see “Kosmopolitizm i suverennost’: chto grozit Evrope? Sotsiolog Frenk Furedi – o vozobnovlenii elementov natsionalizma XIX veka,” www.gefter.ru, April 12, 2017 (available at http://gefter.ru/archive/21851).

5. The term “constructivist institutionalism” is not new: this approach has already been used by different researchers, but in a relatively narrow sense. It is typically viewed as an approach that criticizes other branches of institutionalism (rational choice, historical and sociological institutionalism) and studies institutions as a product of the imagination of social agents. See S. Hay, “Constructivist Institutionalism,” in The Oxford Handbook of Political Institutions, ed. S.A. Binder, R.A.W. Rhodes, and B.A. Rockman (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 56–74. In philosophy, the approach of “constructivist realism,” which acts as a connection between epistemological realism and social constructivism, was developed. Understandably, philosophers use this to solve their tasks. See in particular the article of V. Kharre and V. Lektorskii, “Konstruktivistskii podkhod v epistemologii i naukakh o cheloveke,” ed. V.A. Lektorskii (Moscow: Kanon+, 2009).

6. We should not forget that there are numerous differences between the concepts of these authors. For example, for B. Anderson, who in many ways draws on K. Deutsch’s communication theory, “imagined” nations are not “artificial” formations; on the contrary, he considered them to be entirely real in terms of consequences and placed them in one row with other large (i.e. by definition imagined) communities. But, as a Marxist historian, E. Hobsbawn attempted to describe nations as pure fiction, the “inventions” of the ruling elite that have little connection to people’s real lives. For a more detailed analysis of various concepts, see Natsiia i natsionalizm: Problemno-tematicheskii sbornik, ed. A.I. Miller (Moscow: INION RAN, 1999).

7. See K. Kalkhun, Natsionalizm, trans. A. Smirnov (Moscow: Territoriia budushchego, 2006 [1997]).

8. B. Bonikowski, “Nationalism in Settled Times,” Annual Review of Sociology, 2016, vol. 42, p. 429.

9. See K. Kalkhun, Op. cit.; V.S. Malakhov, Natsionalizm kak politicheskaia ideologiia (Moscow: KDU, 2005).

10. M. Walzer, “Book Review of ‘Nations and Nationalism Since 1780’ by E.J. Hobsbawn,” Social Contract Journal, Winter 1990–1991, vol. 1, no. 2 (available at http://www.thesocialcontract.com/artman2/publish/tsc0102/article_12.shtml).

11. For more on the principles of establishing a modern democracy, see B. Manen, “Printsipy predstavitel’nogo pravleniia,” trans. E.N. Roshchina (Saint Petersburg: Izd-vo Evropeiskogo un-ta v Sankt-Peterburge, 2008 [1995]).

12. D. North, J. Wallis, and B. Weingast, Violence and Social Orders. A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Recorded Human History (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009). The Russian translation of this book was published in 2011 by the Gaidar Institute.

13. D. Acemoglu and J. Robinson, Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty (New York: Crown Publishing Group, 2012). The Russian translation of this book was published in 2015 under the title “Pochemy odni strany bogatye, a drugie bednye.”

14. See D. Lal, Pokhvala imperii: Globalizatsiia i poriadok, trans. B. Pinsker, ed. Yu. Kuznetsov (Moscow: Novoye izdatel’stvo, 2010 [2004]).

15. From comprehensive academic literature see N. Ferguson, How Britain Made the Modern World (London: Allen Lane, 2003); N. Ferguson, Colossus: The Rise and Fall of the American Empire (London: Penguin, 2004); J. Zielonka, Europe as Empire: The Nature of the Enlarged European Union (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006); G. Miunkler, Imperri: Logika gospodstva nad mirom – ot Drevnego Rima i do SShA, trans. L.V. Laninka (Moscow: Kuchkovo pole, 2015 [2005]).

16. See, for example, “Chto takoe ‘novaia imperskaia istoriia,’ otkuda ona vzyalas’ i k chemu ona idet? Beseda s redaktorami zhurnala Ab Imperio Il’yei Gerasimov i Marinoi Mogil’ner,” Logos, 2007, no. 1(58), pp. 218–238.

17. See S. Berger and A. Miller, eds., Nationalizing Empires (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2015). This approach is also being developed by sociologists and leftist post-Marxist intellectuals calling for a rejection of the dichotomy “empire-nation.” See the articles in the thematic issue of the journal Thesis Eleven (April 2017, vol. 139, no. 1), which is entirely dedicated to empires and nation-states.

18. V. Magun and M. Rudnev, “Tipologiia evropeitsev po tsennostiam R. Inglkharta i mezhstranovye sravneniia,” Vestnik obshchestvennogo mneniia, 2012, nos. 3–4, pp. 12–24.

19. E. Pain, The Imperial Syndrome and its Influence on Russian Nationalism; R. Kolstø and H. Blakkisurd, eds., The New Russian Nationalism: Imperialism, Ethnicity, and Authoritarianism, 2005–2015 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016, pp. 46–74).

20. See Obshchestvennoe mnenie – 2015. Ezhegodnik (Moscow: Levada Center, 2016, pp. 54–68).

21. V. Tishkov, “Chto est’ Rossiia i rossiiskii narod?” Pro et Contra, 2007, vol. 11, no. 3, p. 37.

22. V. Tishkov, “Forget the ‘Nation’: Post-Nationalist Understanding of Nationalism,” Ethnic and Racial Studies, July 2000, vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 625–650. The irony is that Tishkov proposes using the concepts of “state,” “peoples,” and “culture” in the place of the category of “nation,” apparently deeming these concepts less metaphoric.

23. R. Brubaker, Nationalism Reframed: Nationhood and the National Question in the New Europe (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 7.

24. V. Tishkov wants all states of the world to be called nations on the basis of the fact that they are part of the UN and “consider themselves” nation-states (see V.A. Tishkov, “Rossiiskaia natsiia i ee kritiki,” in Natsionalizm v mirovoi istorii, ed. V.A. Tishkov and V.A. Shnipelman (Moscow: Nauka, 2007), p. 558.). Many questions arise here, for example: should we consider as democratic those countries and regimes that officially label themselves as such? If we take Tishkov’s position and follow formal logic, then we must recognize North Korea and Zimbabwe under R. Mugabe as democracies. Or should “democracy” also be crossed off the list of categories of analysis as “nation” was? In this case, then shouldn’t we do the same with a “rule-of-law state,” a “republic,” and so forth?

25. A.I. Miller, “Nasledie imperii: inventarizatsiia,” in Nasledie imperii i budushchee Rossii, ed. A.I. Miller (Moscow: Fond “Liberalnaia missiia,” Novoye literaturnoe obozrenie, 2008), p. 22.

26. A. Miller and F. Luk’ianov, “Otstranennost’ vmesto konfrontatsiia: postevropeiskaia Rossiia v poiskakh samodostatochnosti,” Rossiia v global’noi politike, 2016, no. 6 (available at http://globalaffairs.ru/number/Otstranennost-vmesto-konfrontatcii—18477).

27. Identifying with the thesis of the political scientist N. Petrov, Miller wrote that the system of relationships between the center and the regions formed in the 2000s “is a major drag on both the country’s economic development and for the democratization and construction of an effective federation.” A.I. Miller. “Nasledie imperii: inventarizatsiia,” Op. cit., p. 20.

28. See A.I. Miller, Natsiia, ili Mogushchestvo mifa (Saint Petersburg: Izd-vo Evropeiskogo un-ta v Sankt Peterburge, 2016).

29. “Mezhdu imperiei i natsiei. Pochemu Rossii ne nado delat’ etot vybor,” Rossiia v global’noi politike, 2017, no. 1 (available at http://www.globalaffairs.ru/number/Mezhdu-imperiei-i-natciei-18570).

30. D. Rustow, “Transitions to Democracy: Toward a Dynamic Model,” Comparative Politics, April 1970, vol. 2, no. 3, pp. 337–363.

31. Ibid., p. 351.

32. Ibid., p. 350.

33. Ibid., p. 351.

34. G. Almond and S. Verba, The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963).

35. P.A. Taguieff, La revanche du nationalisme: Néopopulistes et xénophobes à l’assaut de l’Europe (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 2015), p. 201. See also D. Miller, Citizenship and National Identity (Cambridge, MA: Polity Press, 2000), ch. 5; P. Manent, La raison des nations. Réflexions sur la démocratie en Europe (Paris: Gallimard, 2006).

36. Bernard Yack proves that solidarity with a national community is far from a manifestation of irrational collectivism, but is instead a manifestation of people’s need for “social friendship.” From this viewpoint, a nation acts as the hub of moral relationships between individuals. See B. Yack, Nationalism and the Moral Psychology of Community (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012).

37. P. Collier, Exodus: Immigration and Multiculturalism in the 21st Century (London: Penguin Books, 2014), pp. 234–241. “It’s no accident,” writes Collier, “that French revolutionaries, heralding modernity, connected brotherhood with freedom and equality: brotherhood is the emotion that can reconcile freedom with equality. It is only when we view others as members of the same community that we can agree that distributive taxation is necessary for ensuring equity and does not infringe on our freedom” (Ibid., p. 237).

38. P. Collier, Exodus, Op. cit., pp. 239–240. See also T.H. Eriksen, “The Problem of African Nationhood,” Nations and Nationalism, 2016, vol. 22, no. 2, pp. 222–231.

39. A. Teslia, “‘Natsiia’ est’ poniatie politicheskoe,” Rusofil, January 12, 2017 (available at http://russophile.ru/2017/01/12/понятия-нация-и-этнос-политически-не/).

40. L. Bershidsky, “The West’s Biggest Problem is Dwindling Trust,” Bloomberg, January 4, 2017 (available at https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-01-04/the-west-s-biggest-problem-is-dwindling-trust).

41. A. Etkind, “Petromacho, ili Mekhanizmy demodernizatsiia v resursnom gosudarstve,” Neprikosnovennyi zapas, 2013, no. 2(88) (available at http://www.nlobooks.ru/node/3432).

42. K. Lesh, Vosstanie elit i predatel’stvo demokratii, trans. J. Smiti and K. Golubovich (Moscow: Logos, Progress, 2002 [1995]).

43. C. Taylor, “Is Democracy Slipping Away?” The Social Science Research Council, February 7, 2017 (available at http://items.ssrc.org/is-democracy-slipping-away/).”

44. “2017 Edelman Trust Barometer Reveals Global Implosion of Trust,” Edelman, January 15, 2017 (available at http://www.edelman.com/news/2017-edelman-trust-barometer-reveals-global-implosion/).