Breaking up is hard to do: Nations,
States, and Nation-States
HGIA Chapter 13
Vocabulary Review
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
State
Colony
Nation/Nationality
Nation-State
Federal State
Unitary State
Nationalism
New Vocabulary
• Homeland: Perceived ancestral territory of a nation
– Some nations are lucky enough to rule their homeland
(France)
– Others are not so lucky (Palestinians, Kurds)
• Stateless Nation
• Regional Autonomy: Limited self-rule for a region
within a larger state
– Quebec, Scotland
• Shatterbelt: a region caught between powerful forces
whose boundaries are continually redefined
– Yugoslavia
Multination State
• Occurs when several distinct nations are found
together in the same political state
– Canada or South Africa
• May lead to ethonationalism
– A strong feeling of belonging to a minority nation that
is contained within a state dominated by a more
powerful nation
– Could lead to:
• Regional autonomy (Scotland)
• Separatism (Quebec, Tibet)
• Secession (Lithuania from USSR)
Mulitstate Nation
• Exists when a national homeland overlaps into
more than one state. One state encompasses the
majority with outliers in neighboring states
• Can give rise to irredentism
– Occurs if a nation’s homeland spills over into another
state and the people on the “wrong side” of the
boundary wish to join their territory with the rest of
their homeland
– Often seen when a nation refers to their homeland as
“Greater _____”
• Greater Somalia or Greater Germany