Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Sheilbh]

Yeah. I don't see nationalism as a dying force in a world where China and India are becoming ever more prominent and important.

What's the alternative you think is getting stronger? The post-war liberal international order - or what?

[The Brain]

What would suggest that nationalism would be dying?

[Tamas]

It is already secondary to cultural issues. The nationalists in Hungary for example are very happy to celebrate and find common ground with the alt right mouthpieces of America. In the 90s and early 00s they would have died rather than being caught agreeing with anything coming from America.

[Josquius]

Indeed. Thats the odd thing with this last gasp nationalism. It is enjoying such success by being what it claims to oppose.
The fact of the matter is with the current generation people are increasingly waking up to the fact that a working class guy in some random English town has far more in common with a working class guy in some random Polish town than either do with the ruling elites in their country.
Traditionally this kind of thinking was at the core of socialism. It led to a growth in progressive values around the world. A decade ago we did seem set for a wonderful place where the internet can cross all the barriers between us and lead to a new world built on facts and understanding....
Of course the regressive forces didn't just take this sitting down. They sought to use the same weapons to push their values. You now have a multi-national battle between those taking the low road and those taking the high road.

For now the low roaders are winning. Their message of hate is so much simpler, more convenient, and easier to spread.
However this isn't sustainable for them.  The very way in which they're enjoying such success at the moment; simple lies targeted at the old, entrenching a 'them and us' divide within countries, will be their downfall. The group they're solidly aligning themselves with are older people who have given up on life and have no hope for a better tomorrow. By being the representatives of this group they are utterly alienating the young (and the not so young. The under 40s in general don't like this)

The right will scoff at this and dredge up the old myth about people becoming more right wing as they become older. However as far as this does apply it is only to economics, the true divide between right and left lies in the social sphere and there we have had a fairly stable forward march for centuries (reactionary blips like the nazis excluded).

Stuff like the Catalans and the Scottish nationalists may on the surface seem to be part of the nationalist wave. But they really aren't. They're something very different. Though Scotland is a nation, the rise in Scottish nationalism is more a rise in regionalism than nationalism. Its a nationalism that has no pretense of Scotland being better than anyone else. It just sees Scotland's future as better served as a separate part of the EU to the UK.
Scottish nationalists absolutely hate it when I bring this next part up- but the existence of progressive nationalism in Scotland has done wonders for absolutely neutering regressive nationalism in the country. Scotland has much the same socio-economic factors at play as northern England, nonetheless man of the ignorant fuckwits in Scotland who south of the border would be blaming Europe for all of their problems have instead been brought into the big tent of Scottish nationalism. True they present a far uglier branch of nationalism than the SNP norm, solidly focussed on finger pointing at the English, nonetheless their votes are going towards a more thought out and forward looking party.

One of the things that really irks me in online circles, even those who claim to be into history, politics, etc... is this belief that so many people have that nation-states are the natural state of things. Games like Crusader Kings and Civilization with their paint the map purple focus really don't help in this.
In actual fact the current international structure solidly focused on the idea of nations has only been dominant for what, 400 years? And even post Westphalia it was far from the only game in town. It wasn't really until the 19th century that it really became established.
Many would argue that in China, as much as they were forced to fall into the international system through their defeats in the 19th century, they never did truly get on board with it and instead see themselves as a civilization rather than a nation. Things are certainly very weird there. Their nationalism is certainly strong and worrying but its quite a different thing to the nationalism we get in the west.

I think the future we're heading towards is one where borders will increasingly mean little. People will align with their contemporaries across the world just as easily as with those that lie 300 miles away within a line that was defined at some point in history (who are somehow more significant than those 20 miles away across another historically defined line).
We will see somewhat of a return to the natural order alongside this of identifying with your locality, only on a much larger scale than individual towns thanks to our transport technology. Basically anywhere within an area you could commute to within an hour or so... but of course you are the centre of your region by this definition, another person who you count as your compatriot within this will have some overlap with you but also count a lot of outside lands within his domain. So its really quite messy stuff that will require a lot of flexiability and cooperation.

[Valmy]

Don't confuse the death throes of nationalism with a lasting trend.

don't think nationalism is dying. It isn't.

The idea that people that happen to share my ethnicity and culture will represent my political ideas better than people who share my political ideas strikes me as rather bizarre and nonsensical. But I guess just because an idea is obviously wrong and bad doesn't mean it will die.

[mongers]

Indeed. Thats the odd thing with this last gasp nationalism. It is enjoying such success by being what it claims to oppose.
The fact of the matter is with the current generation people are increasingly waking up to the fact that a working class guy in some random English town has far more in common with a working class guy in some random Polish town than either do with the ruling elites in their country.
Traditionally this kind of thinking was at the core of socialism. It led to a growth in progressive values around the world. A decade ago we did seem set for a wonderful place where the internet can cross all the barriers between us and lead to a new world built on facts and understanding....
Of course the regressive forces didn't just take this sitting down. They sought to use the same weapons to push their values. You now have a multi-national battle between those taking the low road and those taking the high road.

For now the low roaders are winning. Their message of hate is so much simpler, more convenient, and easier to spread.
However this isn't sustainable for them.  The very way in which they're enjoying such success at the moment; simple lies targeted at the old, entrenching a 'them and us' divide within countries, will be their downfall. The group they're solidly aligning themselves with are older people who have given up on life and have no hope for a better tomorrow. By being the representatives of this group they are utterly alienating the young (and the not so young. The under 40s in general don't like this)

The right will scoff at this and dredge up the old myth about people becoming more right wing as they become older. However as far as this does apply it is only to economics, the true divide between right and left lies in the social sphere and there we have had a fairly stable forward march for centuries (reactionary blips like the nazis excluded).

Stuff like the Catalans and the Scottish nationalists may on the surface seem to be part of the nationalist wave. But they really aren't. They're something very different. Though Scotland is a nation, the rise in Scottish nationalism is more a rise in regionalism than nationalism. Its a nationalism that has no pretense of Scotland being better than anyone else. It just sees Scotland's future as better served as a separate part of the EU to the UK.
Scottish nationalists absolutely hate it when I bring this next part up- but the existence of progressive nationalism in Scotland has done wonders for absolutely neutering regressive nationalism in the country. Scotland has much the same socio-economic factors at play as northern England, nonetheless man of the ignorant fuckwits in Scotland who south of the border would be blaming Europe for all of their problems have instead been brought into the big tent of Scottish nationalism. True they present a far uglier branch of nationalism than the SNP norm, solidly focussed on finger pointing at the English, nonetheless their votes are going towards a more thought out and forward looking party.

One of the things that really irks me in online circles, even those who claim to be into history, politics, etc... is this belief that so many people have that nation-states are the natural state of things. Games like Crusader Kings and Civilization with their paint the map purple focus really don't help in this.
In actual fact the current international structure solidly focused on the idea of nations has only been dominant for what, 400 years? And even post Westphalia it was far from the only game in town. It wasn't really until the 19th century that it really became established.
Many would argue that in China, as much as they were forced to fall into the international system through their defeats in the 19th century, they never did truly get on board with it and instead see themselves as a civilization rather than a nation. Things are certainly very weird there. Their nationalism is certainly strong and worrying but its quite a different thing to the nationalism we get in the west.

I think the future we're heading towards is one where borders will increasingly mean little. People will align with their contemporaries across the world just as easily as with those that lie 300 miles away within a line that was defined at some point in history (who are somehow more significant than those 20 miles away across another historically defined line).

We will see somewhat of a return to the natural order alongside this of identifying with your locality, only on a much larger scale than individual towns thanks to our transport technology. Basically anywhere within an area you could commute to within an hour or so... but of course you are the centre of your region by this definition, another person who you count as your compatriot within this will have some overlap with you but also count a lot of outside lands within his domain. So its really quite messy stuff that will require a lot of flexiability and cooperation.

UDI for Languishia, a constitutional monarchy with Ed Anger as the last ruling monarch and a steward, grumbler, holding the throne til the king returns.

[Iormlund]

Indeed. Thats the odd thing with this last gasp nationalism. It is enjoying such success by being what it claims to oppose.
The fact of the matter is with the current generation people are increasingly waking up to the fact that a working class guy in some random English town has far more in common with a working class guy in some random Polish town than either do with the ruling elites in their country.

I doubt that very much. Very few people are as connected to foreigners as we are. Language is a formidable barrier.

For now the low roaders are winning. Their message of hate is so much simpler, more convenient, and easier to spread.
However this isn't sustainable for them.  The very way in which they're enjoying such success at the moment; simple lies targeted at the old, entrenching a 'them and us' divide within countries, will be their downfall. The group they're solidly aligning themselves with are older people who have given up on life and have no hope for a better tomorrow. By being the representatives of this group they are utterly alienating the young (and the not so young. The under 40s in general don't like this)

That's certainly not true in Spain. Nationalist voters both on the left (Podemos) and right (Vox) are much younger than their more moderate parents.

Also you seem to confuse nationalism with the right. As puzzling as it may seem, there are plenty of leftists nationalist movements.

[Sheilbh]

I also think in France the FN actually do worst among the elderly and very, very well among the young.

[Camerus]

Marxist class consciousness cutting across national lines performed very poorly when push came to shove in the Great War. There seems to be something very powerful about having a shared culture and language. I'm not sure if that has changed as much since 1914 as some people may wish it has.

[Tonitrus]

I tend to agree...outside of the sphere dominated by the USSR's military (eastern Europe), those states that joined the  communist flow (China, NK, Vietnam), while sharing some loose relationships, were still very much primarily of a nationalist flavor. 

[Sheilbh]

I agree-ish. Because I think there is a fairly international class consciousness - I just think it's the Brahmin left, not the traditional or new working class.

[Razgovory]

If you had asked me in 2002, I would have said that Nationalism is on its way out.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah. I don't know. I shifted at some point when I thought Putinism (nationalism of a particular type, crony capitalism, plus elections but maybe on the more managed scale) is an exportable ideological alternative to the end of history. I think it was when Erdogan became more authoritarian as PM maybe in his second term and there was a similar politics emerging in Turkey. But you could see it coming in Israel and India as well and I wasn't convinced the West was immune.

[Razgovory]

India's nationalism is scary.  Like exterminate large portions of the population scary.  I always found nationalism in the US to be infantile and never considered it a meaningful ideology.  Something that unscrupulous politicians pandered to but nobody really took seriously.  "English as an only language",  flag burning amendments, that sort of bullshit.  Stuff that didn't have any impact on important stuff like national defense or whether my drinking water has sewage in it.  But what the hell do I know?  Apparently making sure that Walmart says "Merry Christmas" is more important than preventing them from selling food with rat shit in it.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

Don't confuse the death throes of nationalism with a lasting trend.

don't think nationalism is dying. It isn't.

The idea that people that happen to share my ethnicity and culture will represent my political ideas better than people who share my political ideas strikes me as rather bizarre and nonsensical. But I guess just because an idea is obviously wrong and bad doesn't mean it will die.

it's because you seem to be clueless.