Brown, David. "Are there Good and Bad Nationalisms?". Nations and Nationalism, Vol.5, No.2 (1999): 281-302.

Brown, David. "Are there Good and Bad Nationalisms?". Nations and Nationalism, Vol.5, No.2 (1999): 281-302.

• Most scholarly writers about nationalism identify two ideal types of the phenomenon: civic nationalism and cultural nationalism (281). This article seeks to evaluate contemporary discussions about the liberalism of each concept, and whether cultural naturalism is naturally illiberal (282).
• Cultural nationalism refers to an imagined community built on the myth of common ancestry, along with the accompanying ethnic, racial, linguistic, or religious traits which reinforce these myths (282). Civic nationalism is another imagined community, this one built on beliefs that engaging with the same civic institutions creates a unique sense of national identity and national aspirations (283)
• The division between these two types of nationalism is usually not clear cut. The regressive nature of cultural nationalism -- being based on history -- does not make it illiberal or immoral or visa-versa. Additionally, cultural nationalism will built common civic institutions to cement identity, and civic nationalism searches for historical validation for its imagined community (283, 293).
• The association of cultural nationalism will negative outcomes and authoritarianism likely originates from Karl Marx, who specifically criticized contemporary German nationalism as being ethnically based to the detriment of working class unity and falsely cementing the bourgeoisie state (284).
• The modern argument that cultural nationalism is illiberal, rather than simply detrimental to class unity, began with the work of German historian, Friedrich Meinecke, who said that the ascriptive nature of cultural identity was at odds with liberal individualism and rationality (284). Dr. Meinecke's work was resurrected by Hans Kohn, an Austrian Jewish historian, blamed the violence of Eastern European nationalism on its ethnic and cultural dynamics, as compared to the rational and civic nationalism of the West (284-285).
• A further description and source mine of contemporary research on the liberalism and morality of these two forms of nationalism is available from page 285 to page 287.
• The primary reason given for the belief that cultural nationalism is authoritarian and illiberal is that the primordial and ascriptive nature of cultural groups are counter to rational liberty. The logic goes that ascriptive identities inherently inhibit individual expression, and is an irrational expression of loyalty that must be eradicated if enlightenment and liberalism are to emerge in a society (288).
• The conception of the ethnic nation as naturally irrational and based in uniformity has been questioned since the end of the Cold War. The consensus has changed since then to reflect understandings that all cultural nationalisms are constructed to some degree by political authority. This socially constructed nature means that many cultural communities can actually be open to assimilation (289).
• There is nothing about cultural nationalism which creates a separate form of cognitive bond between itself and the population as compared to civic nationalism, as both rely on myth and invocations of familial bonds between the individual and the nation (290).
• The strongest argument for the essential illiberalism of cultural nationalism claims that cultural nationalism is collectivist, in which individuals are defined by group membership and in which the rights and interests of the community are favored over individual rights (290).
• There are a number of critiques of this view. They counter that many cultural nationalisms do not emphasize the rights of the community over individual rights, but instead argue that a nation in which their cultural space is protected is necessary to the fulfillment of individual rights (291).
• The point commonly made in support of the essential liberalism of civic nationalism is that joining a civic community is rational and voluntary, making it verdant group for liberalism. This analysis ignores the fact that civic nationalisms can also be exclusionary and oppressive in their formation of non-ethnic, but still dictatorial, states or xenophobic immigration policies to safeguard existing civic communities (292).
• Dr. Kohn had proposed a theory that cultural nationalism was most likely to form in societies which had a weak middle class and underdeveloped civil society. This has largely been proven false, as middle-classes are simultaneously liberal and illiberal. The negative case shown most clearly by the strong middle-class support for Nazi nationalism in the Weimar Republic (294).
• Dr. Kohn has also claimed that negative nationalisms, by which he also meant cultural nationalisms, formed primarily in reaction to the imposition of foreign force or culture on a population. The insularity and belligerence of the ideology comes from a sense that the cultural community is under attack (296).
• The distinction between civic nationalism and cultural nationalism in this account is that of internal versus external stimulus for development. Cultural nationalism develops because the status quo is threatening the cultural community, whereas civic nationalism develops to legitimize the current state (296).
• While the author agrees with the assertion that reactionary nationalisms built on resentment are likely to be belligerent and xenophobic, the idea that only cultural nationalisms can be reactionary has no evidence. It is equally possible for a civic identity to be formed in reaction to fear and resentment (297).
• "Those nationalisms, whether civic or cultural, which are articulated by insecure elites and which constitute ressentiment-based reactions against others who are perceived as threatening, which consequently become illiberal. By the same token, perhaps civic and cultural nationalisms which begin as protest movements but do not develop their identity primarily in relation to threatening others, and which are articulated by self-confident elites, are most likely to take a liberal form" (298).
• Despite their differences, both civic and cultural nationalism have in common those traits which allow the creation of progressive or regressive nationalism. The liberalism or illiberalism of nationalism depends on other factors, like the social positions elites, rather than the type of nationalism being promoted (300).