ABSTRACT
Nations and nationalism remain today core concepts for making sense of our societies, their internal and international politics, and a number of other contemporary challenges such as migration, governance, and overall socioeconomic transformation. Nations are faced today with a new set of social and economic challenges: Economic globalization has intensified, bringing with it a more intense phase of cultural interconnectedness and political interdependence. Nation-states see their sovereign powers eroded. Nonetheless, the nation continues to be a powerful source of identity and legitimacy. We are actually witnessing in Europe and worldwide a comeback of nationalism oftentimes in an aggressive, nativist, and populist guise. This chapter reviews the classical approaches to nationalism, including the distinction between ethnic and civic nationalism and also the discussion on the origins of nations: notably the perennialist, primordialist, modernist, and ethnosymbolist schools. The chapter argues that these may be valid and complementary but risk being no longer fit for purpose in explaining where nations and nationalism come from and where they are headed to. The chapter concludes by proposing a new analytical concept of plural versus neo-tribal nationalism.
