The core political elements of nation-building comprise the nation-state plus a high level of social mobilisation and political integration. The state is not the central element solely by virtue of its modern, nation-state form being one of the most important results of nation-building; it is also the decisive player for the most part.
Contrary to the view prevailing in Germany since the Age of German Romanticism that a nation exists a priori and must – or should – eventually be constituted in a state, most historical processes have been considerably more complex and frequently even gone in the opposite direction. “Nations” do not just exist, rather they emerge like many other social phenomena in a difficult and inconsistent process – or simply do not. And in most countries, the existence of a state preceded that of a nation, even in the classic examples of European nation-states like France and England (Greenfeld 1992). For merely practical reasons, it was not rare for a state apparatus to create, intentionally or rather incidentally, a nation corresponding to itself: the old monarchies were hardly ever based on ethnic or national borders but, instead, on religious or charismatic legitimation mechanisms and compulsion. They adopted their later form through conquest or marriage with other ruling houses and not through any defined right of self-determination of the nations, which did not yet exist. And it was only via what were often long historical processes that the state apparatuses, which were becoming stronger and more bureaucratic, were able to form a nation from diverse social groups, e.g. through repression of local rulers, legal regulation of social relations and the fiscal system increasingly affecting everyone, the pressure of homogeneity for a common religion and, later, through nationwide education systems or general military conscription.
In many multi-ethnic (proto)-societies, the impetus for pushing through social integration and creating a nation-state came and comes from the state apparatus itself, using methods like material incentives (financial, economic, public service employment etc.), cultural means (language policy, education system, policy on religion) or compulsion. In many cases, there was and is a link between internal and external causes in this regard, such as the attempt of a weak or rudimentary government to consolidate its position in its own society (and extend its tax base or repress local power factors) and to be able to better overcome foreign policy challenges, especially those of a military nature. The interest in having a fiscal system independent of the local nobility or warlords plus a well-organised and powerful military has represented a particularly important impetus for developing and re-legitimizing systematized state apparatuses. In this sense, most cases of nation-building would have been dominated from the top down rather than the nation-state evolving naturally from society. And, almost always, this type of state-induced nation-building has given rise to complex dialectics between the state apparatus and social groups (as well as between different parts of the state apparatus and between different social groups).
At the same time, nation-building has always signified a process of social mobilisation, either from the bottom up or from the top down. This especially applies to the constituting phase in many instances. The ideological and political process of the shaping of a nation implies its members being involved in its politics, with large numbers of people entering into the political sphere. While politics – and therefore power – was reserved for a small group or stratum of privileged persons over long periods of history and the population was the object of politics, this situation is undergoing fundamental change. The constitution of a “nation” means that ideologically (in principle) all its members now first become political subjects instead of being subservient and tolerant of the politics of the rulers. In this sense, nation-building takes on a democratic potential because belonging to the nation is defined by citizenship or common ethnic-national interests rather than by noble birth or religious position. The power now no longer lies, at least as far as is claimed, with a king chosen by the grace of God but, rather, with the newly constituted society. The fact that it does not necessarily have to exercise what is in principle its sovereignty in a democratic way and can often be organised in a clientelistic, elitist and dictatorial manner is most regrettable, but changes nothing with regard to the legitimatory bond between power and the “nation”, i.e. what is at least claimed to be an all-inclusive community. Nation-building thus opens up democratic potential, but not necessarily the door to actual democracy; on the contrary, power “in the name” of the nation can be more repressive than feudalism or the doctrine of divine right, not to mention “traditional” forms of rule.
Nation-building therefore makes the members of a nation political subjects in principle, even if the exercising of participatory rights is often denied in reality. Nation-building “politicises” the population into a nation, mobilising broad sections of society in the constituting process, in particular. This mostly implies particular social prerequisites, e.g. presupposing a significant degree of communication within the society, which is aided, in turn, by a high level of literacy and appropriate mass and communication media (in certain phases of history this was the invention of printing and, later, newspapers, radio and television).
The process of constituting the nation plus the greater participation of and ability to politically mobilise the population that has become the “nation” does, however, mean that conflicts previously lying dormant in the society and which had little chance of being articulated by virtue of the population being excluded from politics can be effectively intensified. This is all the more true if the determination of who actually belongs to the “nation” has not been settled or is disputed, i.e. especially in multi-ethnic or multi-religious societies that cannot agree on common citizenship as a community criterion. If belonging to the nation is to be determined according to language, ethnic origin or religion rather than on the basis of civil equality, this can easily have two problematic consequences. First, there is a danger that ethnicizing the political discourse in the context of latent conflicts and social mobilisation will lower the threshold for violence and trigger violent conflicts which are ethnically structured. Secondly, such a context transforms the nation-building process: instead of striving for or achieving the integration of society as a whole, the alternative then arises to conduct nation-building either as a repressive project of hegemony by one ethnic group over others or bring about a situation of competition between different nation-building projects conducted by the various ethnic groups. Both lead to the intensification of existing conflicts and the risk of these being waged in a violent manner in the future.
Each nation-building process involves the creation of new political and social structures and mechanisms while overcoming and destroying old ones at the same time. For this reason, it is always and necessarily associated with the redistribution of power. Nation-building has winners and losers in political, economic and social terms – so it can also be used as a means of obtaining advantages for one’s own political or social group.
Pushing through a central government where there were perhaps only regional or local rulers or extensively autonomous rural communities beforehand and bureaucratically regulating a political system formerly based on personal ties, clientelistic relations or charismatic rule are not simply elements of a more technical “modernisation” of social structures; rather they represent a redistribution of power which is perceived as positive by some groups and as a threat by others. Nation-building is thus always a contentious process, fought out in a political, cultural, social, economic or military setting. As soon as a society in this situation is divided in ethnic or religious terms besides the economic, social and other lines of conflict, a further dimension is added to the existing potential for conflict, which can then intensify the course of the conflict as well as give it a completely new structure. Distribution and power conflicts can, for example, be ideologized in an ethno-religious way, which further increases the degree of social mobilisation and makes possibilities for pragmatic solutions more difficult. This also applies, of course, to cases where nation-building is attempted principally as a strategy by external players. Regardless of whether their intentions are of a humanitarian or imperial nature, in the target country nation-building has to bring about passive or active resistance and a shift in the balance of power.
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