ABSTRACT
Collective nostalgia (i.e., sentimental longing or wistful reflection on the ingroup’s past) is often experienced when the ingroup is perceived to be losing connection to its cherished past. The outcome is a desire to re-establish a sense of collective continuity, which can be accomplished via constructive (e.g., promoting the ingroup’s culture and traditions) or destructive (e.g., outgroup exclusion) means. The existing empirical research on collective nostalgia, however, has yet to specify when group members will support one route compared to the other. Inspired by literature on social representations of history, we argue that the extant empirical work on collective nostalgia has unduly treated the content of the nostalgic reverie (i.e., what kind of past group members are longing for) as noise. Herein, we put forth the supposition that the content of collective nostalgia holds predictive utility. In particular, based on research we have conducted, at least two types of collective nostalgia have been identified: nostalgia for a more open society and nostalgia for a more homogenous society. Whereas nostalgia for an open society yields constructive intergroup responses (e.g., support for immigration), nostalgia for a homogenous society yields destructive intergroup responses (e.g., anti-immigration sentiments). In this light, we discuss the malleability of collective nostalgia and the propensity for political leaders (populist leaders in particular) to use and manipulate collective nostalgia (e.g., “make America great again”) as a political tool to advance their agenda.
