ABSTRACT
Several violent conflicts in the 1990s, especially those in Rwanda and the Balkans, drew attention to the terms ‘ethnicity’ and ‘nationalism’. Ethnic conflict is not new, but the revival of nationalist sentiment, the notion that the boundaries of ‘the people’ should coincide with the boundaries of the state, has been a common theme in contemporary conflicts. These conflicts also fuelled an interest in the nexus between security and development. However, in what follows we argue that the relationships between ethnicity, identity and nationalism have had important consequences for development over a longer time period. A historically informed perspective on these issues will create a better understanding of development.