Nationalism: Rising Tide or Victim of Globalization?

Author Anthony Smith’s “Myth and Memories of the Nation” speaks to the issue of whether nationalism is on the rise or on the decline in the wake of the end of the Cold War and the rise of a new, nearly borderless world. Smith contends that to liberals and socialists, the creation of nations and sentiments of nationalism are a halfway point toward global politics because it requires organization and a sophisticated understanding of how interconnected nations are at the economic level. As well, Smith goes on to say that, “ . . . On one hand, the nation can be commended for superseding all those local . . . ties and communities that have restricted innovation . . . On the other hand, the nation today has become a barrier to progress, seeking vainly to control the flow of information and the channels of mass communication . . . ” In essence, Smith sees the problem as the lack of a collective understanding of the public and its leaders about how extensive and unpredictable nationalism can be and how difficult it is to fit nationalism with a globalized world.