It was in 1999, one decade after the fall of the Berlin Wall, that Colin Gray attempted to defend realism against emerging tendencies in international theory, and in so doing made special reference to the enduring legacy of the realist tradition. Such a tradition, and more specifically classical realism, he claimed, might have looked unattractive amidst the optimism which prevailed in the wake of the Cold War . This, however, did not necessarily make it any less accurate: âMuch that is apparently boring and old-fashioned happens also to be true, or true enough.â1 It is the eternal truths of realism, he claimed, that can guide students of international relations in their effort to avoid confusing what is ephemeral with what is lasting.2 In this book, I seek to elucidate the interrelation of two concepts central to realism, one of them ephemeral, and the other one lasting. The lasting concept is that of power, while the ephemeral one is the nation-state. But why, one might wonder, is this interrelation between power and the nation-state one that is worth elucidating in the first place?
As I hope to establish through the pages of this introduction, the centrality of the concept of power in realism can offer a starting point to fruitfully trace the evolution of realist thought on the nation-state and its ideological corollary, nationalism. With the second decade of the twenty-first century ending, it becomes increasingly clear that the optimistic context against which Gray voiced his spirited defence of realism has all but disappeared. Far from being spent forces, the nation-state and nationalism have displayed considerable resilience in the face of globalisation and regional integration . The ghosts of nationalism have even displayed a resurgence in some places which until recently were thought to have put them to rest. The relative neglect with which the phenomenon of nationalism has been met in the domain of International Relations (IR) is, therefore, no longer tenable.3 At the same time, realism, the theory that is commonly associated most closely with the state in textbooks, seems to also have weathered the challenges raised against it and remains one of the key theories of international relations, especially in the bleaker post-9/11 world.4
Approaching Nations, Nation-States, and Nationalism
I have already used terms such as ânation-stateâ and ânationalismâ whose meaning is not universally agreed. I also attached the epithet âephemeralâ to the nation-state. This too is a claim that is not self-evident. I will therefore start my discussion with a brief exposition of the way I understand those key concepts in the present book. The definition of key terms like ânationâ and ânationalism â, the understanding of their nature, the establishment of the relationship between them, and the question of whether they are distinctly modern phenomena have all been central concerns in the study of nationalism as a distinct field of academic enquiry.5 Despite some early works in the first half of the twentieth century, a âfully fledged literature on nationalism â took a while to develop and interest in the subject intensified only in the 1960s and 1970s, triggered by decolonisation and the resulting proliferation of states.6 There is now an extensive literature on nationalism but, as is often the case with social sciences, âthere are no neat definitions of the key conceptsâ.7
One of the most vivid debates in the literature of nations and nationalism is the one concerning the novelty of the phenomena. The dominant approach is without doubt that of modernism , which claims that nations and nationalism are inextricably linked to the advent of modernity .8 The opposite view, the one advanced by ethnosymbolists , emphasises the cultural continuities between the age of nationalism and previous times, and questions the depth of the rift between traditional and modern societies.9 Ethnosymbolists are correct to point out theâoften neglected by modernistsâusage of pre-existing cultural material by nationalism. It would be a mistake, however, to underestimate the qualitative difference between traditional and modern societies.10 The ânaturalâ communities, fixed social roles, and certainty that characterised traditional societies are replaced by the fluidity, social mobility, and uncertainty of modern societies. This transition engenders the need for a new form of collectivity, one that manages to both transcend traditional collectivities and integrate them. The modern ideology of nationalism, by appropriating the past as a national past and projecting the nation on a continuum of past, present, and future, tries to address this challenge.11 Ultimately, therefore, it is not the pre-existing cultural material per se that matters but the way it is appropriated by modern societies.12 As Ernest Gellner noted, it is irrelevant whether a nation has a genuine ânavelâ that connects it to the past or whether it must invent one: what matters is âthe need for navels engendered by modernity â.13
Nationalism , then, is a distinctly modern phenomenon. When it comes to defining it, one can start from the concept of a modern ideology broadly understood as a system of ideas offering both explanatory statements about the world and prescriptions about how it ought to be. The feature distinguishing modern ideology from its traditional counterpart is that it does not seek its explanations outside social reality, and is therefore secular rather than metaphysical.14 Nationalism as an ideology thus contains both descriptive and prescriptive elements: the world is divided into distinct nations , loyalty to them should trump all other loyalties, and nations should be politically independent.15 The core elements of the nationalist doctrine are also evident in the way nations imagine themselves, as discussed in Benedict Andersonâs widely cited definition. The nation , he explains, can be understood as an âimagined political communityâand imagined as both inherently limited and sovereignâ.16 Each member of such an âimagined communityâ will never meet in person all its other members, but still recognises them as such. The nation is imagined as âlimitedâ since âno nation imagines itself coterminous with mankindâ, and as âsovereign â because as a concept it emerged at the time of collapse of the dynastic realm, when pluralism was replacing universalism and the sovereign state was transforming into a symbol of freedom.17
This latter element of sovereignty that a nation aspires to brings in a final and important distinction, that between thenation and the state . The two concepts have been used interchangeably for some time, but are different as the former refers to the cultural and the latter to the political realm.18 Nationalism , as Gellner nicely put it, might claim that the two are destined for each other, but nations and states are contingencies and in reality ânot the same contingencyâ.19 The very coining of the term ânation-state â therefore, as Walker Connor correctly suggested, âillustrated an appreciation of the vital differencesâ between the two. As such, the term âwas designed to describe a territorial-political unit (a state ) whose borders coincided or nearly coincided with the territorial distribution of a national groupâ.20 Such a definition, however, if strictly applied would fail to fit the bill for most existing states. I am therefore proposing to take a somewhat more flexible approach to the term here, one that understands the nation-state as a distinctly modern manifestation of the sovereign state , associated with nationalism as its legitimising principle.21
Approaching Realism(s)
When John Mearsheimer responded to his critics in an article titled âThe More Isms the Betterâ, he most probably did not have in mind more real-isms.22 Recent scholarship by realists and about realists abounds and there is now a marked proliferation of realisms. Apart from the traditional categories of âclassic...