Really Existing Nationalisms A Post-Communist View from Marx and Engels

This book counters a range of assumptions commonly held about Marx's views of nationalism and internationalism, not least by twentieth-century marxists themselves. It shows that Marx did not envisage the abolition of national communities or nation states; that the politics of nationalism in Marx is not incompatible with a politics of class; that Marx was repeatedly critical of a "utopian" internationalism, and that the themes of nationalism and international solidarity, far from being necessarily in opposition, can be seen in many cases as mutually reinforcing. Nationalism then emerges in Marxist theory as a form of political self-identification and mobilization that can contribute to the broader project of social and political freedom.

This is an impressive re-examination of the theories of Marx and Engels on nationalism. The author challenges the conventional view that Marx and Engels lacked the theoretical resources needed to understand nationalism. It argues that the two men had a much better explanatory grasp of national phenomena than is usually supposed, and that the reasoning behind their policy towards specific national movements was often subtle and sensitive to the ethical issues at stake. Instead of offering an insular `Marxian' account of nationalism, the book identifies arguments in Marx and Engels' writings that can help us to think more clearly about national identity and conflict today. These arguments are located in a distinctive theory of politics, which enabled the authors to analyse the relations between nationalism and other social movements and to discriminate between democratic, outward-looking national programmes and authoritarian, ethnocentric nationalism. The book suggest that this approach improves on accounts which stress the `independent' force of nationality over other concerns, and on thos that fail to analyse the complex motives of nationalist actors. It concludes by criticizing these `methodological nationalist' assumptions and `post-nationalist' views about the future role of nationalism, showing how some of marx and Engles' arguments can yield a better understanding of the national movements that have emerged in the wake of `really existing socialism'.

Erica Benner was formerly lecturer in Political Philosophy at Warsaw University