Since its emergence as a major European political movement in the aftermath of the French Revolution, nationalism has played a crucial role in inter-state relations. The formation of modern nation-states, the increasing awareness by each nation of its own uniqueness and, hence, the drive for national self-assertion have become powerful motivating forces for social, economic, and political development.
The nation-state has become the pivot of the modern world system--the independence of each nation emerging as a key condition of peace, security, and freedom. At the same time, because of the deep roots of national prejudice, nationalism has been prone to manifestations of chauvinism, discrimination, and oppression that have hindered not only people directly concerned but have also gravely affected inter-European relations, greatly helping to ignite many international conflicts, including the two World Wars. How to control the huge forces of nationalism is one of the most difficult problems of domestic European and world politics.
The awareness that global issues cannot be solved or managed but through common effort is drawing nations closer together. The trend toward interdependence and integration on a regional, continental, and even world scale is becoming ever more imperative. But those who are drawing from that irrefutable fact the conclusion that the nation-state is an obsolete concept are doing so at their own peril.
Parallel with increasing interdependence, we are witnessing an equally powerful resurgence of self-assertion at national and sub-national levels among minorities and ethnic groups. Interdependency is encouraging the spirit of national self-assertion--the desire of each nation to be included in the scientific technological revolution, escaping permanent subservience to the economically and technologically developed nations. How to reconcile growing interdependence with the resurgence of nationalism may be the crucial problem facing European nations and, for that matter, the whole world.
In search for an answer, let us begin with a few basic assumptions. First, there seems to be an emerging consensus that there is no ultimate solution in sight for this problem and therefore the best we can hope for is the management of the problem so that its inherent contradictions will not adversely influence international relations or the development of individual states.
Second, there is no generally valid formula for the management of the nationalism problem. Of course, there are a few basic, unanimously recognized principles. However, they cannot be themselves lead automatically to the elaboration of a practical policy. The proper formulas are different from one country to another, from one period of time to another; and they are different even within each country, especially if it is a large, multinational state.
Third, although the nationalism question is an intensely domestic one, the experience of other countries, irrespective of their social and political systems, is valuable. For example, Paul Goble, a special assistant for nationalities affairs at the Bureau of Intelligence and Research of the U.S. Department of State, in speaking about the ethnic unrest in the Soviet Union, stressed that Moscow's decision to impose
"a special situation status" in Nagorno
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