Modern Nation and Nationalism

In Spain, Franco started Spanish league to deviate people’s attention from the autocratic polity of the state and he made it sure to have five matches in a week. In the last Cricket world Cup, all Indian offices were closed for the semifinal match between India and Pakistan. The modern nation-state tries to enforce a consciousness of “we-ness” among the people living in a demarcated territory. The passion attached to these events creates a shared consciousness which is beyond the reach of any traditional identity. These forms of consciousness can be very easily attached to a nation state. So, nation becomes the supra-consciousness among the people and all other consciousness sometimes merged into it or accommodated within it. But, despite having this kind of consciousness, why the same nation again engaged into different forms of violent action and why the professed “civil religion” disappears? is it a temporary consciousness or contested space? is the notion of nationalism is universal or exclusive?

The wave of modernization created new set of Baconian identities in different parts of the world. These ideas were further spread by colonizers in 19th Century in Asia and Africa. So, the creation of the concept of nation and nationalism in east and west have been different as in the west it was the product of rationalisation while in east it came through colonial mentors and response to these colonial powers. The process of enlightenment started a process of scientific development in western world, which finally gave rise to Industrial Revolution. Industrial Revolution created a system in which new urban centres, cities, new forms of laws based on “rule of law” doctrine created a new ‘mass’ which had a new kind of consciousness. The technological, institutional and ideological modernity coming from enlightenment process created a new discourse in European society which talked about the notion of nationalism which at that time meant that men united by a common tradition, a common language, and common economic interests should not be politically separated. This feeling appeared most strongly among those nations which were still without a nation-state.

Education was one of the main cause for the success of French Revolution. Education created a society which were sharing similar demands in ‘public’ domain and called for a revolution to have liberty, equality, secular polity etc. to create a judicious society. The nationalism, in initial decades, was primarily a political principle which holds that “the state and culture should be congruent( Gellner, 1983)”. Gellner focused on the ‘universalisation’ process through technological and productive base which made modern society homogeneous, technically skillful, literate, and occupationally mobile. so, he was concerned about the equality of status rather than equality of class. For him, equality of class was not able to maintain in mobile circumstances. Therefore, his pattern of analysis was rooted in Industrialism rather in capitalism. Capitalism was a sub-set of industrialism. Modern values called for universalisation of education, which in-turn established universal communication system in industrial societies. Now, family was not the main place for socialisation rather most of the socialization were coming from outside the domain of family. He calls it “exo-socialization” and it also helped in the creation of ‘universal’ categories. So, basically homogenization was coming from exo-socialisation and for this homogenization, education was the prime mover.

The primary importance given to education was somehow problematic as education was one of the causes for the change in the consciousness but education was not the sole cause for this transformation. Language of the education was one of the barrier for the creation of common consciousness. Most of the education process was carried out in vernacular languages or dialects of the different parts of Europe. But, the availability of books in vernacular languages/dialects were very meagre. The modern mental outlook provided people with the ‘ideas of simultaneity’ in the ‘age of mechanical reproduction’(Benjamin, 1935). The ideas of simultaneity started many popular movements in the arena of arts like Cubism, a very famous art movement, has also roots in this idea. Picaso, in his famous painting was searching for the fourth dimension and Einstein looked for temporal dimension in the space. Walter Benjamin in his 1935 book “The Work of Art in Age of Mechanical Reproduction” says that “the very definition of art is flexible, varying in response to the historic conditions of its production, distribution, and reception.” So, in the age of mechanical reproduction, Print capitalism started in Europe in Latin language but it saturated within 150 years. Then, the revolutionary thrust of capitalism came in vernacularisation of print capitalism. Benedict Anderson(1991) in his work “Imagined communities” tried to present a historiography of development of print capitalism and the rise of the consciousness of nation and nationalism. The vernacularisation of print capitalism was given further impetus by three extraneous factors- change in the character of latin, the impact of reformation, and slow, geographically uneven spread of particular vernaculars as instruments of administrative centralisation by certain well-positioned would be absolutist monarchs.

Capitalism created a system where certain vernaculars mechanically reproduced print-languages capable of dissemination through the market. These languages laid the basis for national consciousness in three distinct ways:-

1. the creation of unified field of exchange and communication below latin and above the spoken vernaculars,
2. a new fixity to language was provided through print capitalism, which build the “image of antiquity” central to the subjective idea of the nation, and
3. languages of power was created and some languages were elevated to a new politico-cultural eminence like King’s English, High German etc.

Anderson takes a departure from Gellner’s concept of nationalism and established that print capitalism gave birth to ‘linguistic nationalism’ which provided ‘national imagined consciousness.” However, this notion of imagined consciousness was criticized by Partha Chatterjee in his book The nation and its fragments: Colonial and postcolonial histories. Chatterjee says that if print capitalism provided the national consciousness then how this national consciousness was not of colonizers?

These nation states spread their ideologies in other countries through the process of colonization. Colonization always had very centralised polity to control the masses. When Mughal gave Diwani rights to East India Company after defeat in Battle of Buxar(1764), then the ‘governmentality’ in the country changed. British started reforming many of the systems in the arena of law, bureaucracy, education, religious affairs etc. The import of enlightenment text in the country, for the education of the subjects of British, created a new consciousness among the masses for the ideals of French Revolution. The social reform programmes started in India in the first half of 18th Century. These reforms had the main aim to create a society based on rational consciousness and universalization. However, there are different connotation that these reforms were the product of national consciousness or not. But, partha Chatterjee in his book The black hole of empire: History of a global practice of power says that Indian nationalism started before the formation of Indian national Congress(1885) and it can be seen in the reform movements famously known as “Bengal renaissance”.

The time frame of first wave of nationalism in India is, however, debated but it is now accepted by most of the writers that Indian nationalism, that confronted British imperialism and celebrated its victory in the formation of Indian nation state was the product of colonial history. However, ‘nationalist historian’ have the view that the sense of unity of India was embedded in the civilisation which gradually emerged to create the modern India. This view was criticized by Prasenjit Duara(1995) critics these views as “teleological model of enlightenment history” which provides false sense of “contested and contingent nation” as unity. The emergence of indian nationalism is discussed between two different ends of the spectrum. At one end, Chatterjee says it was different but a “derivative discourse” from the west and on the other hand counter-modernist like Rabindranath Tagore and Mahatma Gandhi say that it is rooted in our civilisation. C. A. Bayley (1998) recently searched for the ‘pre-history of nationalism’ and finds that it is built on ‘pre-existing sense of territoriality, a traditional patriotism rationalised by indigenous ideas of public morality and ethical government”.

Different theories of Indian nationalism shows various influences and various contradictions in the process. so, one dimensional view of Indian Nationalism will not be able to provide the answer in virtual chaos. Indian mass first erupted against British rule in a mass based movement in 1905 after the announcement of division of Bengal in the name of Swadeshi Movement. This movement, for the first time, saw the participation of women in public sphere. Rabindranath Tagore in his book “Ghar Bhaire” talked about the two domains of Indian household. He explains the different dilemma of Indians in the wake of movement. The notion of mother nation becomes so universal for some that they see the existence of mother goddess in colonizer’s nation too. Ashish Nandi explains different dimensions of nationalism emerging out of the freedom struggle. The by-product of Baconian rationalist model is one of the main concerns for later years. The destruction of harmony between different groups of people and emergence of modern form of violence. In the travelogue Prasye, Tagore had commented on the modern form of sanitized violence increasingly available in modern society.

This form of nationalism gave birth to two factions in Indian society; one was representing the views of Muslims and other were representing the views of ‘India’ as a single unit. But, Many right wing Hindu groups also came in existence in the second decades of 20th century. The idea of nation on the basis of religion came into existence. These ideas were based on early nationalism when nation used to mean congregation of single ethnic groups. The responsivist and reactionary policies of different parties created a consciousness based on religion. Valentine Chirol(1921) finds out that the politicization of Indian mass developed along traditional line rather along class and nation. The Marxist school developed various theories of emergence of Indian nationalism. The clear contrast in the leadership pattern of different parties shows “Bourgeois nationalist consciousness”. Most of the leaders of freedom struggle were from high caste people. Therefore, Sumit Sarkar(1983) finds two levels of anti-imperialist struggles; one elite and other populist. The complex interaction between these two produced continuity through change that created the dominant theme of the period.

Partha Chatterjee has given the different stages of development of nationalism in India. These stages are “moment of departure”, when the nationalist consciousness was formulated through the hegemonizing influence of “post-enlightenment rationalist thought”, “moment of manoeuvre”, when the masses were mobilised in its support and “moment of arrival”, when it became a “discourse of order” and “rationalisation of power”. Further, he differentiates between the two domains of the action of intelligentsia in his 1993 book “The Nation and Its Fragments”; the first domain is material and the other is spiritual. In the inner spiritual domain, they tried to fashion a modern rational culture that is not western and it was where there nationalism was sovereign. he further tells us to study these two domains in their “mutually conditioned historicities”. However, Gyan Praksh(1991) has made partial revision of Partha chatterjee and says that there was no fundamental opposition between these two spheres and the outer dimension was the inner dimension’s existence at another abstract level.

This nationalism was not one way process. British were also trying to reshape the nationalist question for their self serving goals. The cultural-symbolic authority asserted by British through the proclamation of 1858 is one of such example. Bernard Cohn in his essay “Representing Authority in Victorian India” has shown how the cultural symbolic authority was placed on Indian masses and Indian rules through the creation of new awards and new mode of functioning. Partha Chatterjee call it the rise of ‘new nawab’. This reshaping process gave birth to hinduized version of nationalism. Concepts such as modern nation-state were important but now they were shaped through the language that was Hindu in its redefined sense( Nandy, 1995). Gyanendra Pandey(2006) has written about the changing historiography of nationalism in India from secular to exclusive military nationalism. Finally, it gave rise to “Two-nation Theory” and culminated into the partition of the subcontinent.

After the independence of India, she choose secular polity and ‘socialistic’ form of economic system to cater the needs of large masses. The construction of different kinds of reality among the different people of different places resurfaced contradiction in the modern concept of nation state. Various new movement for new nation-state started in Punjab and North-Eastern areas on the basis of religion and ethnicity. However, modernity provided different forms of weapon to modern nation-state to counter these demands and restore the order in the society for a period. These contradictions did not emerge after independence; these were inherent in the freedom struggle itself. The realigning of masses on the basis of traditional identity created different ‘India’ in one India. The demand for separate statehood based on regional consciousness and other criteria shows these contradictions. Ania Loomba(1998) rightly pointed out that in a plural society, nationalism will be a contested ideology and India is the prime example of a plural society. Post-colonial litterateurs, also, show the contradictions in the consciousness of a tribal and an elite. Ranjit Guha calls the historiography of Indian nationalism as “blinkered historiography” as it neglects the contribution made by the people “on their own and independent of elite nationalism”.