ABSTRACT
In today’s seemingly confusing world, there are many processes in action. The major ones are globalisation and the efforts to uphold and maintain nation states within the different networks that have developed as part of globalisation. What is usually connected to globalisation is the increasing speed and efficiency in the flow of international capitalism and the urbanisation processes that follow, resulting in the building up of gigantic city centres as nodes in global networks of flow of information and capital. Living in densely populated areas mandates dependence on the behaviour of citizens acting rationally within the centres. Globalisation puts pressure on nation states to adapt to a certain standard in order to function within the networks it creates. Adaption to these standards, in many cases, threatens identity and specific cultural values. One reaction we have seen with the fall of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, and can observe in many nations of Europe today, is the cultivation of the symbols, politics, and ideology of nationalism. It is possible to see this as a regressive step back to primary identification with the local group—the nation—in the face of the threats caused by globalisation, which does not offer identification 188and signifiers of power to many large groups within individual countries. In some cases, the anger and anxiety created by the new challenges that this brings, together with the reduction of traditional society, brings forth extreme nationalism, involving the cultivation of centripetal symbols and clear, impenetrable boundaries between the in-group and the others, which might be migrant workers or refugees. In the face of such perceived threats, a totalitarian ideology can easily stimulate violent reactions and the scapegoating of other groups. Ideology can function as a body politic, forming the minds of people by indoctrination through mimesis, offering identificatory power to its adherents as part of something bigger and stronger than themselves, which promises rescue and simple order in the maelstrom of globalisation. As a result of the upheaval of many traditional identification signifiers, such as social class, family ties, and meaningful work, unrest will follow, giving precedence for the development of reactive, regressive, nationalistic movements.
