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Leslie Cliburn

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History 22004 Essay

Popular Nationalism in Europe

Between 1870 and 1914 some governments in European countries

attempted to create a popular nationalism within their county. Ernest

Gellner (1983), a Czech social anthropologist, defined nationalism as A

principle which holds that the political and the national unit should be

one. The Cambridge Dictionary defines nationalism as The wish for and

the attempt to achieve political independence for your country or nation.

A great or too great love for your own country. There are three phases in

which nationalism came about in European countries during the late 19th

and early 20th centuries. Miroslav Hroch (1985) broke the three phases

down as the following: phase one is the cultural movement, phase two is

the political movement, and phase three is the mass movement. It is also

important to look at word nation which nationalism is built upon. Anthony

Smith (1991) defines nation as A named human population sharing an

historic territory, common myths and historical memories, a mass, public

culture, a common economy and legal rights and duties for all members.

Cambridge dictionary defines nation as a country, especially when thought

of as a large group of people living in one area with their own government,

language, traditions, etc. A large group of people of the same race who share

the same language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
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area. Within the nation are two types of different nations which European

countries used to nationalize their countries. The two types of nations are

civic and ethnic nations. A civic nation is a nation which emphasises

citizenship rather than an individuals ancestry. Tom Nairn (1997) says the

characteristics of a civil nation are that civil nations are a social order.

Nairn (1997), states that this civil order contains a sense of decency,

privacy, individual and group or minority right, freedom of initiative and

enterprise, etc. On the other hand, an ethnic nation is a nation that

emphasises on the idea of community of birth and shared ancestry. Aviel

Roshwald (2001) defined ethnic nationalism as A phrase used to denote

the assertion of a collective identity centered around a myth of common

biological descent- an extension of the kinship principle to a large

population- and, as its corollary, a claim to territorial sovereignty. The

term can also refer to any movement that focusses on common, objective

cultural characteristics (linguistic, religious, folkloric, or any combination

thereof) as the foundation of political nationhood. France and Russia were

two European countries that used their governments to attempt to create

popular nationalism during the late 19th and early 20th century. Both

countries, France and Russia, used very different techniques and methods,

and were two completely types of countries in the manner in which they

tried to create a popular nationalism.

France was one of the countries that tried to create popular

nationalism in its country staring in the late 19th century. France would be

considered a civic nation of the two types of nations because France

emphasised citizenship because they wanted to emphasise on citizenship

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rather than ancestry. Eric Hobsbawm (1994) explained that the main goal

of the Third Republic of France was to turn peasants into Frenchmen and

Frenchmen into good Republicans. From that statement one can conclude

that France mainly wanted to help unify the people within their country.

Eugen Weber (1976) had a pretty well laid out theory on how France could

nationalise the country by the masses (or the third phase of how a country

can promote nationalism). Weber (1976) stated in his thesis that there are

three main points to why France nationalised to the masses. Eugens first

reason was because before 1870 peasants had little or no interaction at all

with the economy and therefore these peasants had no sense of

nationhood. Many of Webers critics believed that he stretched the truth

when he explained the political awareness among the peasants before

1870. Eugens second reason for France nationalising to the masses was

the local patois common. Finally, the last reason Eugen Weber thought

that France nationalised to the masses was that because statistics showed

that less than half of the people living in France at the time did not even

know how to speak French.

Weber (1976) believed there were four ways in which the French

government could nationalise their country. The first way was

modernization of transport in which France went from having 18,000 km

of railways to having over 65,000 km of railways. France extended its

railways and transportation by over three times than it had previously.

Another way in which Eugen Weber thought the French government could

nationalise the country is by creating a universal military service. This

universal military would require that every male would have to serve five
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years in the military. This policy was created in 1872. The third way in

which France nationalised its country was through education. The Jules

Ferrys reforms of 1872 granted free and compulsory education to

children. The final way France nationalised the country was by creating

national symbols. The French did this in two ways. The first way was by

creating a national anthem. The Marseillaise became the French national

anthem. The second way France used national symbolism to create

nationalism was celebrating their independence day. July 14th, also known

as Bastille Day, became a national holiday for France.

France tried very hard to nationalise their country. Being a civic

nation France made many beneficial decisions that were best for everyone

who lived in France. As Eric Hobsbawm (1994) stated, The main goal of

the France was to turn peasants into Frenchmen and then turn these

Frenchmen into good Republicans. France did many things to help these

peasants and the rest of France as we have seen. Free education, creating

a universal military, increasing transportation, and creating national

symbols were all ways in which the French attempted to nationalise their

country. We will see next that Russia took a very different approach to

attempting there country as a nation which would fail terribly.

Russia on the other hand approached nationalism on a completely

different spectrum than France did. Russia started off as a civic nation as

France did but it gradually became an ethnic nation. As we saw earlier an

ethnic nation is a nation that emphasises on the idea of community of

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birth and shared ancestry. This was just a disaster waiting to happen in

Russia because Russia was a multi-ethnic empire and had over one

hundred different groups. Aviel Roshwald (2001), states that Russia made

up 43% of the different groups that made up the country. Russia basically

wanted to make all the non-Russian cultures become of Russian culture

and replace their religion with the Orthodox Religion. As you can see this

type of ethnic nationalism would lead to uprisings in countries such as

Poland who stood up against Russias policy of Russification.

Weeks (2001), tells us that Poland was one of the first countries to

rise up against Russia. He goes on to say that Russia saw the Poles as

hostile, especially after uprisings in 1831 and 1863. Weeks (2001), says

this type of hostility lead Russia to creating what is called Russification.

This type of nationalism called Russification was the procedure of Russia

just wiping out every non-Russian culture and religion and replacing them

with the Russian culture and Orthodox Religion. Aviel Roshwald (2001)

states, The Russification campaign was designed to help modernize and

consolidate the state bureaucracy by establishing a uniform language of

administration throughout the empires far-flung territories. It was also

designed as a repressive and/or pre-emptive measure directed against

certain rebellious ethnic groups (notably the Poles after the crushing of

their 1863 uprising). Weeks (2001), believes there are three ways in

which Russia tried Russifying Poland. The first way that Russia tried

Russifying Poland was by renaming the Poland. The kingdom of Poland

was renamed the Vistula Provinces of the Russian Empire. Another way

Russia used their new method of nationalism was by shutting down Polish
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schools and establishing new schools. This happened to the Warsaw

University when Russia shut it down and established a new Russian

university. The Russians did allow Poland to use their own language in the

school though because Russia was afraid they would be faced with a high

resistance from the Poles (Roshwald, 2001). Lastly, Russia tried

Russifying Poland buy trying to convert the Poles language and religion

to those used by the Russian culture. Russia was very brutal to the Poles

and we can see why ethnic nationalism was doomed from the beginning.

Trying to force cultures to convert to a common belief system will almost

always result in countries uprising against the people and government

trying to convert them. Russia did the same exact thing to Lithuania as it

did to the Poles. Russia used this Russification on the country of

Lithuania by converting all the Catholics and Lutherans to the Orthodox

Religion. Russia also took over the school system in Lithuania. The schools

in Lithuania were taken over by the Russian Ministry of Education. The

Russian government also did to Lithuania what it did to Poland.

Universities such as the one in Dorpat were shut down in 1893.

As stated earlier, Russia attempting to nationalise all the different

countries by means of being an ethnic nation was a recipe for disaster

from the very start. The biggest reason for the failure of Russia attempting

to nationalise all the different cultures was most likely due to the fact that

there were over one hundred different cultures in Russia at the time and

Russia attempted to nationalise the individuals. The process of

nationalising these countries, Russification, was just not a smart way of

converting the other countries who were non-Russian. One can only
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wonder if Russia would have been as successful as France if they had

established there selves as a civic nation rather than an ethnic nation.

In conclusion, we have seen that European countries had very

different ways of attempting to nationalise their countries. One might say

the two types of nations under nationalism differed drastically as well. The

civic and ethnic nations were complete opposites when it came to

nationalising countries such as France and Russia did. On one hand the

civic nations (such as France) were more focused on citizenship rather

than ancestry. On the other hand the ethnic nations (such as Russia) were

the exact opposite. They were more focused on ancestry rather than

citizenship which as we have seen caused many issues in the process of

nationalising its country. We have also seen that nationalism had both

positive and negative outcomes for the countries. Nationalism helped

bring the country together in France by helping the citizens feel like they

had a sense of nationhood. They also helped children get an education

for free and established a national anthem and an independence day.

There were also negative outcomes because of nationalism. Russia

experienced negative outcomes because the tried nationalising the

individual and because of the diversity of cultures within the Russian

empire at the time. This led to uprisings against Russia from groups such

as the Poles from Poland. Overall though, whether having negative or

positive outcomes, countries tried to establish popular nationalism

throughout Europe during the late 18th and early 19th centuries to promote

their country.
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References
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Gellner, Ernest, Nations and Nationalism, 1983.

Hroch, Miroslav, Social Preconditions of National Revival in Europe,

1985.

Hutchinson, John & Smith, Anthony D. (eds.) Nationalism pp.76-83, Oxford: Oxford

University Press.

Nairn, Tom, Faces of Nationalism: Janus Revisited, 1997.

Rostlwald, Aviel, Ethnic Nationalism and the Fall of Empires: Central

Europe, Russia, and the Middle East, 1914-1923, 2001.

Smith, Anthony, National Identity, 1991.

Weber, Eugen, Peasants into Frenchmen: the Modernization of Rural France, 1870-1914

(1976).

Weeks, T.R, Russification and the Lithuanians, 1863-1905; Slavic Review,

Vol. 60, No. 1 (Spring 2001) pp 96-114.