European Integration and the Nationalities Question


Book Description

A highly topical examination of the effect of European integration on relations between states and minority nations. This new collection brings together the leading specialists in the field, and covers a wide range of cases, from Northern Ireland in the West, to Estonia and Latvia in the East, and Cyprus in the South-East. The contributors assess how European integration has affected the preparedness of states to accommodate minorities across a range of fundamental criteria, including: enhanced rights protection; autonomy; the provision of a voice for minorities in the European and international arena; and the promotion of cross-border cooperation among communities dissected by state frontiers. The comprehensive chapters stress the importance of the nationality question, and the fact that, contrary to the hopes and beliefs of many on the left and right, it is not going to go away. Beginning with an introductory essay that summarizes the impact of European integration on the nationalities question, this accessible book will be of strong interest to scholars and researchers of politics, nationalism, ethnic conflict and European studies.




Marxism and the National and Colonial Question


Book Description

Originally published 1934, a collection of articles and speeches on the nationalities question in the Soviet Union. Before the 1917 revolution, Stalin was the Communist Party's expert on the "nationalities problem"; after the revolution he became Commissar for the Nationalities in the early years of the Soviet Union. The nationalities problem was a debate over which national groups of the old Russian Empire were to remain a part of the new Soviet Union and which should form independent nations. The material in this book covers Finland, Georgia, Poland, and Ukraine; the national question in Yugoslavia; and many related topics.




The Bolsheviks and the National Question, 1917–23


Book Description

In a timely re-examination of the origins of the system which fell apart so dramatically in 1991, this book deals with the policies of the Soviets towards the non-Russian nationalities of the former Russian Empire. Making extensive use of previously unavailable material from the Soviet archives, Jeremy Smith explores the attempts of the Bolsheviks to promote the development of minority nationalities in the Soviet context, through a combination of political, cultural and educational measures, and looks at the disputes surrounding the creation of the Soviet Union.




The National Question


Book Description

Provocative writings on the question of national self-determination and its relationship with socialism.




The National Question


Book Description

This volume examines the volatile nature and complex dynamics of national movements and ethnic conflict around the world.




Nationalism Reframed


Book Description

This study of nationalism in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union develops an original account of the interlocking and opposed nationalisms of national minorities, the nationalizing states in which they live, and the external national homelands to which they are linked by external ties.




The National Question in Yugoslavia


Book Description

Even before it collapsed into civil war, ethnic cleansing, and dissolution, Yugoslavia was an archetypical example of a troubled multinational mosaic, a state without a single national base or even a majority. Its stability and very existence were challenged repeatedly by the tension between the pressures for overarching political cohesion and the defense of separate national identities and aspirations. In a brilliant analysis of this complex and sensitive national question, Ivo Banac provides a comprehensive introduction to Yugoslav political history. His book is a genetic study of the ideas, circumstances, and events that shaped the pattern of relations among the nationalities of Yugoslavia. It traces and analyzes the history and characteristics of South Slavic national ideologies, connects these trends with Yugoslavia's flawed unification in 1918, and ends with the fatal adoption of the centralist system in 1921. Banac focuses on the first two and a half years in the history of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, because in his view this was the period that set the pattern for subsequent development of the national question. The issues that divided the South Slavs, and that still divide them today, took on definite form during that time, he maintains. Banac provides extensive treatment of all of Yugoslavia's nationalities; his sections on the Montenegrins, Albanians, Macedonians, and Bosnian Muslims are unique in the literature. In this unbiased account, all of the principals and groups assume a tragic fascination. When published in 1984, The National Question in Yugoslavia was the first complete introduction to the cultural history of the South Slavic peoples and to the politics of Yugoslavia, and it remains a major contribution to the scholarship on modern European nationalism and the stability of multinational states.




The National Question


Book Description




The State, Identity, and the National Question in China and Japan


Book Description

The first decades of the twentieth century witnessed an explosion of nationalist sentiment in East Asia, as in Europe. This comprehensive work explores how radical Chinese and Japanese thinkers committed to social change in this turbulent era addressed issues concerning national identity, social revolution, and the role of the national state in achieving socio-economic development. Focusing on the adaptation of anarchism and then Marxism-Leninism to non-European contexts, Germaine Hoston shows how Chinese and Japanese theorists attempted to reconcile a relatively new appreciation for the nation-state with their allegiance to a vision of internationalist socialist revolution culminating in stateless socialism. Given the influence of Western experience on Marxism, Chinese and Japanese theorists found the Marxian national question to be not merely one of whether the "working man has no country," but rather the much more fundamental issue of the relative value of Eastern and Western cultures. Marxism, argues Hoston, thus placed native Marxists in tension with their own heritage and national identity. The author traces efforts to resolve this tension throughout the first half of the twentieth century, and concludes by examining how the tension persists, as Chinese and Japanese dissidents seek identity-affirming modernity in accordance with the Western democratic model.




Marxism and the National Question


Book Description

In this highly referenced volume, Stalin defined the nation and laid out the Marxist-Leninist position on national liberation. The results resounded throughout the colonial world. "What is a nation? A nation is primarily a community, a definite community of people. This community is not racial, nor is it tribal. The modern Italian nation was formed from Romans, Teutons, Etruscans, Greeks, Arabs, and so forth. The French nation was formed from Gauls, Romans, Britons, Teutons, and so on. The same must be said of the British, the Germans and others, who were formed into nations from people of diverse races and tribes. Thus, a nation is not a racial or tribal, but a historically constituted community of people."