Nations : the long history and deep roots of political ethnicity and nationalism / Azar Gat ; with contributions by Alexander Yakobson.

"What are the origins of nationalism and why is it capable of arousing such intense emotions? In this major study, Azar Gat counters the prevailing fashionable theories according to which nations and nationalism are modern and contrived or 'invented'. He sweeps across history and around the globe to reveal that ethnicity has always been highly political and that nations and national states have existed since the beginning of statehood millennia ago. He traces the deep roots of ethnicity and nationalism in human nature, showing how culture fits into human evolution from as early as our aboriginal condition and, in conjunction with kinship, defines ethnicity and ethnic allegiances. From the rise of states and empires to the present day, this book sheds new light on the explosive nature of ethnicity and nationalism, as well as on their more liberating and altruistic roles in forging identity and solidarity"-- Provided by publisher

Includes bibliographical references.

Print version record.

Acknowledgments; 1 Introduction: is nationalism recent and superficial?; Ethnicity has always been political; How deep did premodern ethnonational identity reach?; The underlying dispute; Concepts and definitions; Ethnos and ethnicity; Peoples; Nation and national state; Nationalism and patriotism; 2 The evolution of kin-culture communities; Kinship and culture in the past 150,000 years; Evolutionary inheritance and historical transformation; 3 From tribes to statehood; Tribal growth and ethnic expansion; From tribes to states; State formation, tribal erosion, and ethnicity.

4 Premodern ethne, peoples, states, and nations around the worldA Ethnos and city-state; The cradle of civilization; Phoenicians, Greeks, and Rome; Premodern America, Africa, Asia, and Europe; B The premodern national state; Ancient Egypt: the first state -- and first national state; Nascent national states in the ancient Near East; China: the largest and most enduring ancient people and state; In the giant ́s shadow: national states around China; C Were empires ethnically blind?; From Assyria to Persia; The Hellenistic and Roman empires; The Arab, Ottoman, and Mughal empires; Conclusion.

5 Premodern Europe and the national stateGeopolitics: statehood in the Classical Mediterranean and in emergent Europe; A The mushrooming of national states in emergent Europe; The British Isles: a history of four nations; Scandinavian identity and national identities; The medieval German national empire; The Czech lands; The Polish national state and empire; The Russian nation and the Russian Empire; Conclusion; B Southern versus northern Europe; Medieval national states and the clutches of empires in southeast Europe.

States, geography, and national consolidation in Romance southwest EuropeThe French paradigmatic case; C Was the premodern European nation impossible due to religion, empire, dynastic rule, inequality, and dialect fragmentation?; Religion and the nation; Empire; The dynastic national kingdom; Sociopolitical inequality; How deep was dialect fragmentation?; Conclusion; 6 Modernity: nationalism released, transformed, and enhanced; A The will of the people and the nation: what enabled what?

B Civic nations or ethnic nations? Europe, the English-speaking immigrant countries, Latin America, Africa, and AsiaThe European national templates; The European Union; The English-speaking immigrant states: purely civic nations?; Ethnicity and nation-building in Latin America; Ethnicity and nation-building in sub-Saharan Africa; Ethnicity and nation-building in the southeast Asian archipelago; Ethnicity and nation-building in India and Pakistan; Conclusion: civic versus ethnic nations?; C National conflict and solidarity in a globalizing world.

English.

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