1
Exclusion for Democracy?
Adam James Tebble, Department of Political Science, Brown University
Young women march against verbal and physical abuse for wearing revealing clothing on the
streets of major urban centres. Gay and lesbian activists blow whistles and wave placards
denouncing the withdrawal of gay awareness programmes in schools and universities, whilst
outraged university students unfurl banners depicting the last gruesome moments of animals
undergoing ritual slaughter. Citizens of all ages, income groups and both sexes march against
the erosion of their culture, racism in employment practice and education and the failure of the
state to ensure homeland security. All chant the slogan: “Identity, Democracy and Justice”.
The images are familiar, as are the issues. Yet, this is no depiction of a rainbow
coalition of concerns that seeks to influence a political process that the participants feel
marginalised and alienated from.
It is, rather, the depiction of an entirely new political
preoccupation with identity and culture from the right-wing - often extreme right-wing - of
politics. For, perhaps in response to mass migration and policies of multiculturalism, there have
arisen and continue to arise in many Western liberal democracies political movements and
parties that address issues of identity, democracy, the impact of global capitalism and the
destruction of cultural values that have in recent times been considered to be the preserve of the
multicultural left. From the Christian Coalition and Buchananite and Dukeite ‘cultural warriors’
in the United States, to the emergence of right and far right movements and political parties in
Western Europe, North America and Australasia the rightward orientation of the cultural turn is
a phenomenon that it is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.
Indeed, what can be called the New Social Movements of the Right may in fact prove to
have a far more significant impact upon public policy formation than those of the left to which
the overwhelming majority of attention has been given in academia.1 Whilst in countries such
as the UK, France, Australia, Belgium, Denmark and Norway, such parties have had an impact
unheard of in the last half century, in others such as Austria, the Netherlands, New Zealand,
Switzerland and Italy they have actually achieved national government.2
Moreover, the
th
atrocities of the 11 of September 2001 and the general elections that took place in their
aftermath in many western democracies suggest that it would only take one significant event to
1
On this see Dryzek, J., Deliberative Democracy and Beyond, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000 p.
23; Barry, B., Culture and Equality, London, Polity Press, 2001, p. 277.
2
A point which would make Miller’s reason for ignoring the claims of the far right on the grounds that
they have no ‘prospect of taking hold as the public philosophy of one of the technologically advanced
liberal democracies’ seem to be more a case of wishful thinking than hard-headed analysis. On this see
Miller, D., ‘Communitarianism: Left, Right and Centre’ in Miller, D., Citizenship and National Identity,
Oxford, Polity Press, 2000, p. 102.
2
tip the balance of popular rather than fringe opinion still further in the nationalistic cultural
right’s favour.
1.i Three Kinds of Nationalism
Of course, this is not to say that there is a single nationalist viewpoint. Indeed, there are at least
two types of nationalist argument which are commonly discussed in the academic literature.
The first of these is a nationalism that seeks to defend either social democratic or some other set
of values. The second, by contrast, is more conservative in its outlook and sees national identity
as a good in itself and, indeed, one that is in need of preserving regardless of the kind of
political culture that the national identity underpins. In more philosophical terms, we may say
that these two varieties of nationalism differ to the extent to which they regard national identity
in instrumental or constitutive terms. In the academic literature the first of these viewpoints is
represented in a particularly systematic way by David Miller who defends a principle of
nationality as instrumental to the pursuit of social justice.3
The second constitutive or
conservative nationalist perspective takes nationality and national culture as worthy of
protection by the state as they are as goods in themselves.
This viewpoint has gained
contemporary expression in the work of Roger Scruton.4
This notwithstanding, the central claim of this paper will be that both of these positions
do not adequately capture what makes nationalism a newly resurgent force in politics. For what
is unique about much nationalist discourse today is its power to both baffle and surprise. Most
interestingly, perhaps, the nationalist contribution to public discourse concerning culture and
identity is opening up wholly new and hitherto unexpected fissures in politics that seem to
transcend the hitherto dominant liberal and conservative conceptions. From the multiracial
supporters of California’s Proposition 187 and the openly gay but immigration and
multiculturally-sceptical Pim Fortuyn in the Netherlands, to Jewish supporters, candidates and
high-ranking members of supposedly far-right political parties in Europe and the British
National Party’s ‘outreach’ programmes to Hindus and Sikhs in the UK, contemporary
nationalism destabilises in a most fundamental way our received notions of identity, democracy,
toleration and, indeed, what it even means to be on the right-wing of politics.5
3
See David Miller, On Nationality, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1995; Citizenship and National
Identity.
4
Scruton, R., The Meaning of Conservatism, London, MacMillan, 1980, Chapters 2 and 3;‘In Defence of
the Nation’, in Scruton, R., The Philosopher on Dover Beach, London, St. Martin’s Press, 1990, pp. 299328.
5
Proposition 187 denied all but essential public services to illegal immigrants and had a high degree of
support from American Blacks as well as Whites. During the last presidential election in France, many
Jews voted for Jean-Marie Le Pen because of their perception that the far-right Front National would deal
more vigorously with Muslim immigrants whom they blamed for a rise in anti-Semitic attacks. In 2004
Londoner Patricia Richardson was the first Jewish candidate to stand for the British National Party which
is committed to the voluntary repatriation of all non-white immigrants. Cohen, David, ‘Why I’m in the
BNP’, Evening Standard, London, 26.03.04. Prominent Austrian journalist Peter Sichrovsky was the
Party General Secretary of the right-wing Freiheitspartei Österreichs (FPÖ) until September 2002.
3
In order to capture this it will be claimed that there is in fact a third nationalist
perspective that is distinct from the traditional liberal and conservative understandings.
Furthermore and to introduce the second claim of this paper, it will be argued that this ‘new
wave’ nationalism is more in tune with contemporary nationalist sentiment that the two other
versions despite having no representation in the academic literature. The reason for this has
much to do with the fact that it appears to be particularly adroit at appropriating much of the
public language and ethical reference points governing political discourse about identity that
emanate in the main from the left - more specifically the multicultural left to which, ironically, it
is so profoundly opposed - and reapplies them to the national community, thus giving it a
relevance and timeliness far beyond those liberal and conservative varieties of nationalism that
are the mainstays of academic consideration of these themes.6
The issue of the non-existence of a third ‘new wave’ nationalist position is, of course, of
academic interest in its own right. A subsidiary claim of this paper, then, will be that this
position is an emergent one in the world of politics and civil society and one that merits serious
discussion in academia. The fact, therefore, that all the citations used in this paper in support of
the existence of such a position are from the news print and other, non-academic, media should
not been regarded as deficiencies of the position; as if this were somehow reflective of
intellectual unworthiness. What we are witnessing, rather, is the emergence of a position that is
yet to find a voice, let alone a research project, in contemporary political theory. It is one,
however, that may well deserve both.
In this paper I will outline the liberal and conservative versions of nationalism and claim
that they both fail to account for the political relevance of contemporary nationalism. Building
upon this, I will outline what will be called the new wave nationalist position that both borrows
and yet is distinct from the other two versions of nationalism discussed. Like the principle of
liberal nationality, new wave nationalism appeals to progressive values yet also contains
conservative aspects that claim that those values are constitutive of our identities and, as such,
are non-negotiable. Moreover, it will be claimed that the politics of culture is by no means the
preserve of the political left. Indeed, what makes new wave nationalism so powerful as well as
distinct from liberal and conservative nationalism is that it borrows the language of
multiculturalism to justify political positions that are quite opposed to it.
1. Liberal Nationalism
Similarly to authors such as Nancy Fraser, Brian Barry and John Dryzek, David Miller locates
political theory’s concern with culture in the historical demise of communism. In the wake of
A similarity which I hope has been made clear by this paper’s opening paragraph’s self-consciously
‘right-wing’ parody of the opening passages of Iris Young’s Justice and the Politics of Difference. On
this, see Young, I. M., Justice and the Politics of Difference, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1990,
p. 15.
6
4
the break-up of the Soviet Union ‘[i]t matters less,’ he writes, ‘whether the state embraces the
free market, or a planned economy, or something in between.’ Rather, ‘[i]t matters more where
the boundaries of the state are drawn, who gets included and who gets excluded, what language
is used, what religion endorsed, what culture promoted.’7
However, for Miller the post-
communist concern with culture and identity is not only manifested in the West in the
politicisation of minority group claims within society. Indeed, to end the analysis here would be
to tell only part of the story of the cultural turn for it leaves unanswered the question of the
determination of the political conditions in virtue of which these and other claims are made. The
link between these two types of concern with culture, of course, is the notion of national identity
for it is one of Miller's primary contentions that without a conception of national identity we
cannot make adequate sense of any of the claims we make in politics, multicultural or
otherwise, nor of the persistent nature of national sentiments
Yet, what for Miller is a national identity and what purpose does it serve? The notion of
national identity contains three interconnected propositions. First, national identity is part of
our personal identity; that is, national identities exist for us and are rationally defensible. Of
course, to say this does not commit Miller to a realist social ontology for his account of national
identity is an anti-essentialist one. That is, national identities are following Benedict Anderson,
‘imagined communities’ that are ‘constituted by belief’.8 Another way of saying this, of course,
is to say that Miller defends an interpretative account of national identity in which ‘it is a
mistake to begin from the position of an outside observer trying to identify nations by looking to
see which people have common attributes such as race or language.’9 Rather, national identities
must be conceived of as existing ‘when their members recognize one another as compatriots,
and believe that they share characteristics of the relevant kind’.10 In Ernest Renan’s memorable
phrase, Miller tells us, the nation is ‘a daily plebiscite’ whose existence ‘depends on a shared
belief that its members belong together, and a shared wish to continue their life in common’. 11
The second proposition in the account of national identity is that nations are ethical
Miller, D., On Nationality, p. 1. See also see Fraser, N., ‘From Redistribution to Recognition?’,
Dilemmas of Justice in a “Postsocialist” Age’, in Fraser, N., Justice Interruptus: Critical reflections on
the “Postsocialist” Condition, New York, Routledge, 1996, pp. 11-39.
Barry, B., Culture and Equality, London, Polity Press, pp. 3-5; Dryzek, J., Deliberative Democracy and
Beyond: Liberals, Critics, Contestations, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000, p. 57.
8
On Nationality, pp. 22, 32; ‘In Defence of Nationality’, in Citizenship and National Identity, p. 28. See
also Tamir, Y., Liberal Nationalism, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1993, p. 8. On imagined
communities see Anderson, B., Imagined Communities, London, Verso, 1991, rev. edn. In all Miller lists
five elements that define what a national community is. The community should be ‘(1) constituted by
shared belief and mutual commitment, (2) extended in history, (3) active in character, (4) connected to a
particular territory, and (5) marked off from other communities by its distinct public culture.’ On
Nationality, p. 27.
9
On Nationality, p. 22.
10
op. cit, emphasis added.
11
On Nationality, p. 23; ‘In Defence of Nationality’ in Citizenship and National Identity, p. 28. See also
Renan, Ernest, ‘What is a Nation?’ in Zimmerman, A. (ed.), Modern Political Doctrines, London, Oxford
University Press, 1939.
7
5
communities of obligation that generate duties among fellow nationals. Thirdly and related to
this, states that are formed from national communities have a good claim to be self-determining
in order that these duties and obligations of fellow nationals may be fulfilled.12 From the above
it is clear that Miller's motive for defending national identity is not only an explanatory one. It
is also normative in that he claims that national identity should be defended.
1.i Trust, Social Justice and Deliberative Democracy
Miller’s reasons for defending the idea of national self-determination - that is, that it is ‘valuable
for the boundaries of political units (paradigmatically, states) to coincide with national
boundaries - fall into two sets, dependent on whether they are reliant upon the defensibility of
the idea of nationality itself; that is, upon the defensibility of proposition 1.13 The first set of
reasons move us from the idea of a nation to the idea of the state and, tracking his account of
national identity above, claim that ‘national identities are defensible, and [that] we are justified
in acknowledging special obligations to compatriots,’ propositions that Miller defends in the
first two chapter of On Nationality.14 Thus, when a nation is politically autonomous - that is,
when it has its own state - it is able to implement schemes of social justice, protect the national
culture and is able to view itself as autonomous and to some extent at least as the master of its
own social and economic destiny. By contrast, the arguments from state to nation rely only
upon the idea of people valuing ‘the effective functioning of political communities.’15 That is,
when states are populated by citizens who share a common national identity, they are more
likely to trust one another in order to solve collective action problems (such as providing a clean
environment) support schemes of social justice and engage in deliberative democracy.16
Clearly, the most prominent reason here - it is the only one that features in both sets of
reasons - is that a common national identity or nationality is crucial for the pursuit of social
justice.17 That is, for Miller, the sense of obligation, solidarity and mutual trust that is emergent
from a solid national identity is instrumental to the pursuit of social justice:
‘[I]f we believe in social justice and are concerned about winning democratic support for
socially just policies, then we must pay attention to the conditions under which different groups
will trust one another, so that I can support your just demand on this occasion knowing that you
will support my just demand at some future moment. Trust requires solidarity not merely within
12
On Nationality, pp. 10-12.
On Nationality, p. 82.
14
On Nationality, p. 82.
15
On Nationality, p. 82, emphasis added.
16
On Nationality, pp. 82 - 98.
17
See also Miller, ‘Group Identities, National Identities and Democratic Politics’ in Citizenship and
National Identity, p. 78. See also Tamir who claims that the ideas of social justice and national identity
go hand-in-hand. Liberal Nationalism, pp. 10, 117-121.
13
6
groups but across them, and this in turn depends upon a common identification of the kind that
nationality alone can provide.’18
Of course, the importance of nationality to the pursuit of social justice does not immediately tell
us how the state should be self-determining. After all, an aristocracy or some other elite may
run the state and could conceivably pursue social justice. Yet, Miller contends that the citizenry
as a whole should be actively engaged in running the state so that national self-determination is
just that, genuinely national in the sense that it is reflective of national, rather than sectional,
interests.19 Thus, it follows from this and from the fact that national identities are constantly
evolving that citizenship is best conceived of in republican terms ‘according to which the citizen
should be actively engaged at some level in political debate and decision-making.’20 Ideally,
moreover, this republican form of citizen participation is taken to endorse a deliberative form of
democracy in which ‘decisions are reached through an open and unforced discussion of the
issue at stake where the aim of all participants is to arrive at an agreed judgement.’ 21 It is here,
then, where the specifically liberal nature of Miller’s account becomes explicit. Rather than
viewing nationality as being exclusive and authoritarian, it is constantly evolving and can lend
itself to the pursuit of liberal goals within liberal institutions without marginalizing the interests
and voices of minorities.
3.i Belonging to Imagined Communities: What is so Private about Wearing a Burkha to the
Supermarket?
Now, Miller is certainly correct to claim that the imagined and active character of national
identity means that it is liable to change; that is, that such identities are in a constant state of
flux.22 However, precisely this subjective, imagined character also has profound implications
for his account of nations as possessing distinct public cultures or, in older terminology,
national identities that need politically to be upheld.23
On Nationality, p. 140; see also pp. 83-5, 90-96; ‘Is Deliberative Democracy Unfair to Disadvantaged
Groups?’, in Citizenship and National Identity, p. 158; ‘In what sense must Socialism be
Communitarian?’, Social Philosophy and Policy, 6, pp. 51 - 73. Another quasi-Hayekian argument that
Miller makes is that a strong sense of national identity is needed not only to ensure the trust necessary for
mutual obligations to be met, but that it also functions in this way when societies are, like the majority of
national societies are, large scale entities marked by mutual ignorance. National identity, then, acts as a
kind of impersonal glue of obligation that allows us to make demands upon and in turn accept demands
made upon us by countless unseen others. On this see On Nationality, pp. 83, 92, 98; ‘Bounded
Citizenship’, in Citizenship and National Identity, pp. 87 - 88.
19
On Nationality, p. 89.
20
On Nationality, pp. 150, 194 - 5.
21
On Nationality, p. 96.
22
On Nationality, pp. 126-8
23
On Nationality, pp. 25-7. Tamar Meisels has argued that despite his understanding of national identity
as that of an imagined community, Miller in fact assumes an objectivist position, most obviously in his
discussion of secessionist claims in Citizenship and National Identity. There is, however, little textual
evidence to support this view throughout the bulk of his writing on the subject. On this, see Tamar
18
7
We will recall that out of the need to distance his position from the more extreme
versions of nationalism, Miller discounts certain factors that members of the national
community must share from the account of the distinctive public culture, despite acknowledging
that there must be at least some such features in order for that culture to be distinctive. In the
first instance Miller wishes to exclude the characteristic ‘that our fellow-nationals must be our
‘kith and kin’, or that they all be born in the territory of the nation in question´. 24 ´Secondly, he
claims that it is erroneous ‘to suppose that the common public culture required for a national
identity must be monolithic and all-embracing’.25 From this, he concludes that neither the food
one eats, the clothes one wears, nor even the music one listens to are ‘normally part of the
public culture that defines nationality’ and which in turn is the source of particular ethical
obligations to fellow nationals.26
Yet, this seems problematic in a number of important respects. Firstly it seems to
exclude a number of very fundamental characteristics that many would suppose do play a part in
defining what it means to be a member of a national community. Physical appearance and style
of dress in particular - but in this day and age with ever more powerful and portable sound
systems - even the music one listens to do play a part in defining the public culture, and hence
identity, of a nation.
This is because whilst being private in the sense of being private
preferences, choices concerning dress, language use, food and music do have a public impact on
other people’s lives. In this way, they may be conceived of as part of the public architecture of
a society - the kinds of things, like buildings, that manifest cultural and even, to extend the
sense of Barry’s usage, ‘propositional content’ which through action not only concretise a
nation’s public culture but also reveal what the substance of that culture is.27 Even physical
appearance, whilst not usually being the results of personal choice, contributes in its own way to
how a locality ‘feels’ to its inhabitants. The various Chinatowns in many of the worlds great
cities, for example, are not considered to be such because they are populated by middle-class
Europeans who have embarked en masse upon some ethnic fad, but because they are populated
by people who look, eat and sometimes even dress like Chinese people. In this sense we may
borrow from argument found in much feminist literature that emphasises that the ostensibly
private can often be political. Wearing a burkha to the supermarket in Eastbourne, for example,
may be a private, individual decision - although on many occasions one must remain sceptical
Meisels, ‘Territorial Resolutions in Divided Societies’, in Daniel A. Bell and Avner de-Shalit (eds.)
Forms of Justice: Critical Perspectives on David Miller’s Political Philosophy, Lanham, Rowman and
Littlefield, 2003, pp. 183-203.
24
On Nationality, pp. 25-6
25
On Nationality, p. 26
26
op. cit. On the idea of the public culture as a source of particular ethical obligations, see On Nationality,
pp. 68-70.
27
Barry, Culture and Equality, p. 270
8
of even this much - but it is also undoubtedly an act of public significance and impact. The
same, of course, would go for not wearing one to the market in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.
Of course, what is curious about this is that Miller readily accepts the link between the
physical features of a society, the content of its public culture or national identity and the
interest of the national community in preserving those features via the institutions of state.28 So,
contrary to Miller, it would seem that such factors cannot be excluded in advance – as if part of
some private realm - from the list of things that on at least some occasions may contribute to a
national community’s self-understanding. Indeed, the ideas of a national dress, a national food
or a national music express in a particularly vivid way that such things do express the identity
and cultural characteristics of the national community. It would be wrong, of course, for
conservative nationalists to take heart from this and conclude that such factors must always be
contributive to national identity and appeal to them in order to exclude members of certain
groups. That is precisely the point of the subjectivist, imagined nature of identity that Miller’s
account presupposes: what is to count as public and private will vary both between and within
societies.
Yet, importantly this is equally problematic for Miller. With the assumption of an
interpretative position with respect to the imagined nature of national identity one cannot help
but conclude that such factors can and often do enter the community’s daily plebiscite of shared
belief and mutual commitment and consequently membership may be accorded, or withheld, in
virtue of them. To attempt to rule such factors out of the equation of nationhood and belonging
in advance, then, would not only seem to run the risk in many instances of emptying the notion
of national identity of much of its meaningful content, but runs contrary to Miller’s own
philosophical understanding of what it means to be a member of the national community and
how this may vary from place to place. Of course, the reason that Miller does rule them out, is
to gain some critical distance from the more intemperate varieties of nationalism. Yet he is
unsuccessful to this end because the imagined nature of identity necessarily commits him to the
proposition that in at least some places not only dress and language but even one’s race may
well enter into the self-definition of the nation.
Yet, equally problematically, Miller does in any case seek to rule what he views as core
components of national identity in. Underlying his view here, of course, is an understanding
one of the alternatives to a politics of nationality as a ‘cultural free-for-all’ or ‘cultural
supermarket’. Yet, Miller´s argument here is implausible because there is no guarantee that
resultant from a deliberative democratic process even what he takes to be core aspects of
national identity will be transformed or stripped away entirely. Importantly, then, without
imposing principled side-constraints upon the kind of issue that citizens can debate, Miller’s
account of republican participation could yield similar results to the cultural free-for-all. Of
28
On Nationality, pp. 87-88
9
course, if he were to impose such constraints this would raise serious doubts about his
commitment to participatory and deliberative politics. In any case and similarly to the issue of
ruling aspects out, to stop at any point with regard to any given aspect of the identity and
attempt to institutionalise its permanence is just, as Miller would say, to set the identity in stone
or cast it in aspic. Indeed, Miller explicitly claims that ‘[t]he role of the sate should not be to
impose some preformed definition of national culture on people who may resist it, but to
provide an environment in which the culture can develop spontaneously rather than being
eroded by economically self-interested action on the part of particular individuals.’29 Yet, why
the protection of landscapes, musical traditions or even languages is not to impose a preformed
definition of national culture is a question that Miller appears reluctant to answer. Again, this
core essentialism of the liberal nationalist account of national identity would seem to make it
unusually close to the conservative ideal it seeks to distance itself from.
Given identity’s imagined nature, then, rather than attempt to define in advance who
and what does an does not belong in which public culture and, importantly, on what grounds,
we would be better off developing principles of justice that leave individuals free to discover
answers to such questions rather than having them imposed by the state. That is, to develop
principles that in themselves are agnostic about such issues but which are nonetheless capable
of providing answers.
3. ii Identity, Democracy and Social Justice
As we have seen Miller endorses the idea of participatory republican politics and deliberative
democracy as the means by which national identities may be transformed on an open, unforced
and equitable basis.30
Yet, it is questionable whether this kind of political process sits
comfortably with contemporary trends in nationalist discourse. This is made clearer when we
examine Miller’s claim that multicultural theorists assume away the problem of majority
hospitality for it would appear that this is also a problem for his own theory. Majority and host
communities could, and indeed, increasingly do argue that it is the minorities that must adapt to
the social reality they have chosen to reside in if they are to be accepted or, in Miller’s own
terms, if they are to be received into the imagined public culture
Thus, despite arguing
convincingly that multiculturalism assumes away the problem of majority hospitality whilst at
the same time seeking to displace any overarching conception of nationality in virtue of which
minority claims can be fairly made, Miller too assumes away the problem of majority
29
On Nationality, p. 88, emphasis added
Of course he is quick to point out that we should look at deliberative democracy as but a regulative
ideal in this respect – as a useful approximation of how just decision would look – and one that is usually
unattained in actually existing polities. Nevertheless, he believes that some form of deliberative
democracy where ‘decisions are reached through an open and uncoerced discussion of the issue at stake
where the aim of all participants is to arrive at an agreed judgement’ is necessary to ensure the legitimacy
of its decisions. On Nationality, p. 96.
30
10
hospitality. For the majority group it seems unrealistic - if not something of a confidence trick that republican participation and deliberative democracy are intended only to facilitate the
transformation or stripping away of aspects of national identity that the nation’s component
groups may find repugnant or that the public sphere should be free of ‘symbols, practices and
unstated assumptions that prevent members of some groups from participating as equal
citizens’.31 Interestingly, he cites Australia as a country where the national identity has been
progressively and democratically transformed in the manner he favours.32 Yet, it is debatable
whether this was a transformation the majority community of British origin ever desired, nor
whether it was rather a product of top-down, often ghastly, bipartisan collusion rather than
bottom-up grass-roots pressure for diversification, a fact that perhaps has been periodically
exposed when the population has been given the direct opportunity to express its view on issues
such as the monarchy.33
Yet, perhaps the most serious problem with the account of republican participation and
deliberative democracy is that, as a procedural account of the public decision-making process
there is no guarantee that the decisions it arrives at will be in accord with Miller's ultimate goal
of the achievement of social justice. After all, and particularly given the diversity of voices
Miller wishes to see in some sense included in public, transformative discourse, there is no
guarantee that they will speak univocally with respect to society’s political goals. Deliberative
democratic participants, that is, may equally endorse a programme of sweeping privatisation of
public services as they would vote to protect or reform the institutions that mete social justice.
It may be true as Miller contends that our national identities ‘are not set in aspic’ - at least if
they are set within pervasive liberal institutions - but neither are our political goals, especially if
they are the objects of such an avowedly transformative public discourse procedure as
deliberative democracy.
As we have seen, Miller’s principal concern in defending a principle of nationality is
that it is instrumental to the trust, solidarity and sense of mutual obligation that is a prerequisite
for the pursuit of social justice.34 However and similarly to the above problem with the account
of deliberative democracy, the defence of social justice itself is problematic in at least two
31
'Group Identities, National Identities and Democratic Politics' in Citizenship and National Identity, pp,
79 - 80; On Nationality, p. 142
32
On Nationality, p. 135
33
Witness the 1999 referendum on the republic which failed in every state and territory except the
Australian Capital Territory - where the federal government is based - and where one of the more
prominent arguments in its favour was that it was more representative of contemporary multicultural
Australia and would therefore enable New Australians to identify with their adopted country.
Furthermore, the 1998 general election that saw the overtly anti-multicultural One Nation Party obtain
over 1,000,000 votes, not to mention the disturbing lengths to which opponents of this party in the highest
echelons of government sought to undermine it, culminating in the imprisonment and subsequent
acquittal of its leader on charges of electoral fraud in 2003.
34
ibid., pp. 83 – 5, 91 – 92 footnote 14, 93 – 6, 98, 139 – 40, 185. See also Miller, D., ‘In what sense
must Socialism be Communitarian?’ Social Philosophy and Policy, 6 (1988 – 9), pp. 51 – 73; Market,
State and Community, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1989.
11
respects. Firstly, it is by no means certain that the public culture will be sufficiently solidaristic
to carry the burden of social justice. It is here, of course, where Miller draws a distinction
between the ‘strength’ and ‘character’ of national identity.35 Doing so enables him to claim that
the counter-example of a country like the United States that has a strong national identity but an
‘unusually individualistic’ public culture does not damage his argument for nationality as
necessary for the pursuit of social justice.36 Yet, even if this is so, it does commit him to a
particular kind of national identity - one that is both strong and of a solidaristic character - if
social justice is to be realised. This, of course, subverts idea of an evolving national identity.
National identity, that is, may move away from a solidaristic to an individualistic conception
and thus cannot be appealed to as the basis for an account of social justice. Another way of
saying this, of course, is to say that social justice may need an account of national identity but it
does not follow that national identity needs an account of social justice. Indeed, in an earlier
discussion Miller is quite explicit about this. ‘Nationality,’ he writes, ‘is associated with no
particular social programme: the flexible content of national identity allows parties of different
colours to present their programmes as the true continuation of the national tradition and the
true reflection of national character’.37 Yet, if this is so, what role does nationality play in the
account of social justice? The answer is that it may not play any role in the cultivation of the
bonds of trust necessary for social justice and, as such, is a redundant aspect of the theory.38
What these criticisms highlight is the fundamentally instrumental nature of Miller’s
theory for if the principal reason for defending a principle of nationality is to secure the
conditions of social justice this merely raises the question of why social justice should be
pursued. This is, of course, an answer that Miller does not give and indeed, if he did, it would
seem to sit uneasily with his commitment to the democratic transformation of national identity
and the cultural diversity towards which he professes to be sensitive. The idea that the public
culture may be transformed, but only insofar as it does not challenge the pervasiveness of the
ideal of social justice would seem to make that culture a rather stale and ossified one; one that is
indeed cast in aspic.
Moreover, and only if we assume that the account of social justice is unproblematic,
Miller claims we need a principle of nationality to cultivate those bonds of trust and mutual
obligation that guarantee the smooth running of its institutions. Yet, regardless of whether the
principle of nationality is capable of doing so, there is in any case good reason to contend that
35
On Nationality, p. 94
On Nationality, p. 94
37
‘In Defence of Nationality’, in Citizenship and National Identity, p. 33
38
See also Kukathas, Chandran, The Liberal Archipelago, pp. 208-9 where he claims that ultimately
Miller’s conception is wanting because despite requiring that ´people live by standards they do not
recognize or cannot abide, 'it is in any case unnecessary because society can be organized politically so
that it functions properly and so that different ways of life can coexist. The liberal nationalist state, then,
is as unnecessary as it is undesirable.
36
12
the very institutions that dispense social justice - that is, those of the welfare state - are
themselves complicit in the undermining the bonds of trust required to sustain them. For the
monopolisation by the state of the process of welfare provision means that individuals are
excluded from the very process by which they gain trust in one another, particularly in times of
need. That is, by institutionalizing a relationship of entitlement between the individual-in-need
and the state, the institutions of social justice make trust, and indeed, any other ethical value, an
unnecessary commodity because recipients never have to interact with donors on an ethical,
potentially trust-cultivating basis. Being a matter of entitlement rather than, say, agreement
between individual recipients and donors and donor agencies, the welfare state only succeeds in
acting as a kind of moral steriliser that stifles the very cultural process in virtue of which values
such as trust could actually emerge.
Of course, the issue of the corrosive effect of the welfare state upon the emergence and
sustenance of relationships of trust raises another important issue: that of the incentive structure
that immigrants encounter when they enter a new country. It seems that one important reason
why Miller finds himself having to defend a principle of nationality in the first place is the
concern that the universal entitlements of the welfare state act may serve to warp the incentive
structure that attracts migrants, particularly those from countries for whom the concept of
money and other benefits falling as if manna from heaven is entirely alien. The problem here is
that it is all too easy for immigrants to be accused of being work-shy and of failing to contribute
to society through the tax system. Immigrants, that is, fail ´to do their bit for society and only
take from it. The consequence of this is to put an often intolerable political strain upon host
community acceptance of immigration itself, or, if not this, then of migrants receiving welfare
benefits.
Of course for Miller, the trust-enhancing role of a common nationality acts to
counterbalance this. Yet, it seems reasonable to assume that without the welfare state, both the
numbers and types of immigrant attracted by a new life in a new country would be substantially
different and those who really were work-shy would either leave or self-select not to come, thus
rendering the principle of nationality unnecessary.
With this in mind, it remains unclear
whether an assimilationist principle of nationality would be needed so as to cultivate trust. That
is, a welfare state-free society would be more likely to attract migrants who already have the
requisite social skills and attitudes to successfully interact with the host community, thus
lowering the costs of assimilation, of immigrant social exclusion and, importantly in Miller’s
own terms, of host community hospitality. All the universal guarantees of the welfare state
achieve, then, are to act as disincentives toward integration and mutual understanding as they
make it relatively costless to fail to integrate and seek acceptance.
The existence of a
13
multicultural welfare state would, upon this account only make matters worse for it would not
only remove the economic incentive to integrate but also the cultural one.39
This is an issue of which Miller is certainly aware. In a footnote to his discussion of the
role of trust in the sustenance of social justice he concedes that perhaps ‘a lesser degree of trust
is required to support a night watchman state’.40 Yet, rather than giving a principled answer as
to why it is not possible, then, to do away with the role of nationality as the cultivator of trust,
he only records his empirical scepticism with regard to such an option being a viable possibility
in the late twentieth century.41 Thus, it is questionable in any case whether the pursuit of social
justice is what makes nationalism so attractive. For conservative nationalists at least, the
transformative aspects of Miller’s account makes any professed nationalism to be merely
subservient to the liberal values and, as such, is something of a flirtatious tease to true believers
in the value of the nation. What Miller has to say about national identity may as he happily
accepts be heretical to liberal minded cosmopolitans but for conservative nationalists the real
heresy is in the failure to be sufficiently nationalistic.42 Rather, it would seem that it is the
conservative claim that national identities are goods in themselves that is the best explanation of
nationalism’s enduring attractiveness. With this in mind, let us examine this doctrine.
2. Conservative Nationalism
We saw earlier that nationalist thought broadly divides into two camps, one largely liberal and
individualistic, the other, conservative and collectivist. Another way of capturing this is to
claim that conservative nationalism distinguishes itself from its liberal counterpart in that it sees
the value of national identity not in instrumental terms as subservient to some other goal such as
the pursuit of social justice, but rather in constitutive terns as a good in itself and without which
the community ceases to be the community that it is. For conservative nationalists, that is, the
cultural integrity of national identity is itself the ultimate value as it provides the preconditions
that make justice possible. Of course, we may ask here what makes this position any different
from Miller's account. We will recall that he too makes much of the idea of national identity
providing a pre-political sense of mutual obligation. Yet he goes on to claim that it is needed
ultimately so that the political conditions for the achievement of social justice may be secured,
something which conservatives would not necessarily sympathise with. Rather, at the heart of
the conservative nationalist viewpoint are the ideas of authority and tradition where the
institutions of nationality are to be respected. That is, as Miller elucidates in his discussion of
39
Another issue here is that no matter how benign our attempts to make the mechanisms of assimilation
and identity formation are, one ultimately must resort to the power of the state to enforce the mechanisms
that are agreed upon, to the exclusion of other possible accounts of intercommunal cohesiveness.
40
On Nationality, pp. 91-2, footnote 14.
41
On Nationality, p. 91, emphasis added
42
On Miller’s supposed heresies see, ‘Introduction’, Citizenship and National Identity, p, 7
14
this position - a discussion which will be a principal reference point here - ‘the nation is
conceived not merely in terms of horizontal ties to fellow-members, past and present, who share
whatever features are taken to constitute the common identity, but in terms of vertical ties to
established institutions, which are regarded as authoritative.’43
The implications of this view of established institutions according to Miller are
threefold. The first of these relates to the stance of the state towards minority faiths and
practices. Rather than being one of neutrality - that is of equal recognition or of equal lack of
recognition - the state gives formal recognition only to the institutions through which the
national identity is expressed. This, Miller tells us following Scruton, is the ‘establishment’ and
may include institutions such as the monarchy and the church.44 Above all, the conservative
nationalist believes that the state should not ‘confer the same status on the institutions of
minority faiths as it does on the national church, because to do so would be to weaken the
authority of the national institutions.’45 Secondly, there arises an injunction to protect these
institutions, as well as the beliefs and practices that constitute them, from criticism in order that
their authority be maintained. Finally, the conservative nationalist conception ‘is bound to
entail a discouraging if not prohibitive attitude towards would-be immigrants who do not
already share the national culture.’46 The contrast with the principle of liberal nationality could
not be clearer. Where the liberal nationalist position defends republicanism and deliberative
democracy as the means by which the public culture and the institutions that embody it can be
interpreted, criticised and, if need be, revised, for the conservative nationalist this would be to
violate what is essential to our having politics in the first place. Similarly, where the principle
of liberal nationality would, with qualification, be permissive with respect to immigration, for
the conservative nationalist to admit immigrants who do not already share the national identity
would be to undermine its authority and to weaken the pre-political conditions of justice.
4.i The Critique of Conservative Nationalism
Miller’s general critique of conservative nationalism is that it ‘moves from a valid premiss that a well functioning state rests upon a pre-political sense of common nationality - to a false
conclusion - that this sense of common nationality can be preserved only by protecting the
present sense of national identity and the authority of the traditions that now express it.’47 This
broad view, moreover, is reflected in his more particular criticisms of the three aspects of the
conservative nationalist position.
43
On Nationality, p. 124
On Nationality, p. 125
45
On Nationality, p. 125
46
On Nationality, p. 127
47
On Nationality, p. 129, emphasis added. See also 'Communitarianism: Left, Right and Centre', in
Citizenship and National Identity, pp. 103- 104
44
15
Miller’s principal criticism of the conservative nationalist deference to the authority of
tradition and national institutions is that it fails to acknowledge the changing nature of identity
and the fact that we need liberal freedoms in order to secure the legitimacy of the ensuing
discourse that manages that change.48 Importantly, Miller is not claiming that at any given
moment our national identity will not be experienced by at least some of us as substantial.
Rather, it is to claim that the articulation of this experience is itself only one of many possible
interpretations of the authority of the traditions that underpin the national identity. Given this,
for Miller it is important that there is a ‘collective conversation’ about the status of our national
institutions - one that is secured in large measure by liberal freedoms of conscience and
expression and the institutions of deliberative democracy - rather than enforced respect.
Miller is less explicit in his criticism of conservative nationalism’s position with regard
to state neutrality and its attitude toward minority faiths and practices.
Nevertheless, his
position can be divined from the above criticism of conservatism’s hostility towards criticism of
establishment. Presumably, the liberal nationalist position would be contrasted with that of the
conservative nationalists not in the sense that at some point there may be a particular faith that
receives state recognition and protection as part of establishment. Rather, he is concerned to
claim that which faith may be recognised will always be open to deliberative democratic
agreement.49 The difference, then, is that for Miller the state may be non-neutral both in the
substance of its attitude toward, for example, religion whereas at all times is ought to be neutral
insofar as the public procedure for the determination of that substance is concerned. By
contrast, for the conservative nationalist, the state must always be non-neutral in substance and
procedure with respect to such issues. Importantly, however, Miller does concede that ‘where
some cultural feature - a landscape, a musical tradition, a language - has become a component
part of national identity, it is justifiable for the state to discriminate in its favour if the need
arises.’50
Miller’s critique of conservative nationalism with regard to immigration is that it is
unduly harsh in its desire to use immigration policy as a tool for the maintenance of national
unity.51 Rather than pursue an overly restrictive immigration policy, Miller contends that his
own liberal principle of nationality only asks that immigrants be willing 'to accept current
political structures and to engage in dialogue with the host community so that a new common
identity can be forged.’52 Let us now look more closely at each of these criticisms.
One aspect of the conservative nationalist position to which we may with Miller object
is the claim that our national identity should be immune from criticism and treated with
48
On Nationality, p. 127
On Nationality, pp. 180-1, 195
50
On Nationality, p. 195
51
On Nationality, p. 120
52
On Nationality, p. 130
49
16
deference and respect. The problem here is that over the course of history this tends not to
happen regardless of whether conservatives think it should. The case of the evolution of the
religious identity of England from the reign of Henry VIII to Elizabeth I is particularly
instructive here.
By the conservatives’ own argument England should have remained
subsequent to Mary I, the Catholic nation that it had been for the previous millennium and the
temporary supremacy of the Church of England under Henry VIII - today’s established church
since Elizabeth I - dismissed, although perhaps tolerated, as an historical aberration. The cut-off
point of the national identity and component institutions to which we should defer, then, is
always an artifice of politics and, perhaps more importantly if it is not, the result of a hitherto
inflexible political system having to come to terms with social forces beyond its control. As
such, the content of national identity is somewhat arbitrary.53
Given our broad agreement with Miller here the next issue is that of state neutrality.
We will recall that the conservative position can be characterised as one of partial-in-substance
and partial-in-procedure. Yet, as we have seen, if the body of institutions that the state if
supposed to be partial towards are merely the result of the art of politics, then it seems arbitrary
for the state to be particularly partial towards them.
Given, then, our rejection of the conservative nationalist partial-in-substance and
partial-in-procedure position, the question becomes whether Miller’s partial-in-substance but
neutral-in-procedure position is an adequate response to the issue of state neutrality.
The
further question that needs to be asked here, of course, is whether there should be a substantive
conception of national identity, regardless of whether it is worked up from a neutral public
procedure. This, of course, ties in with the instrumental role national identity plays in Miller's
account as the guarantor of the bonds of trust necessary for the political sustainability of
redistributive policies of social justice.
The problem here is that this specifically social
democratic account of justice is not defended but rather asserted. Yet, without an account of
why the public culture should be coloured by the precepts of social democracy, Miller’s claim
that we need a substantive account of national identity to underpin it remains unsubstantiated.
The fact that the account of the formation of the substance of national identity is more inclusive
than that of the conservative nationalists is, therefore, beside the point.
Moreover, and
consistent with Miller’s ethically particularist presuppositions, it seems in any case that the list
of things which may be viewed as component parts of the national identity would vary greatly
from nation to nation with the result that the state may in fact be wholly partial in its stance
53
The position of the pro-James, Duke of York Tories during the Exclusion Crisis of 1678-81 was both
philosophically consistent and politically commendable in this respect. For them, the fact of the Duke’s
Catholicism should not have been allowed to trump the fact that he was, according to tradition, the
rightful heir to the throne rather than Charles II´s protestant bastard son James, Duke of Monmouth. The
Exclusion Crisis, of course also lead to the formation of the first modern Tory and Whig political parties.
17
toward minority faiths, cultures and languages.54 At this point, then, there seems little to
differentiate Miller’s position from the position he seeks to reject.
Similarly, his critique of conservative scepticism of immigration seems fanciful.
Firstly, as we have seen, Miller does not give an account of why the host community would find
a transformative dialogue with immigrant communities desirable, given that they presumably
already have a settled sense of national identity. More problematically still, he fails to
acknowledge in his critique of the conservative attitude toward immigration that some
immigrant groups do not appear as willing to accept current political structures or the values
that underpin them as he expects. Moslems in the United Kingdom, for instance, set up their
own ‘Muslim parliament’ in 1992 as they regarded Westminster as inimical to their interests
and also demonstrated contempt for the values of democracy itself when rioting outside the
Houses of Parliament in 1988 over the publication of Salman Rushdie’s novel The Satanic
Verses. Given this, it seems entirely plausible that such groups should not be welcomed by the
host community and accorded recognition as co-imaginers of national identity, just as
conservative nationalists would have us believe. Yet, despite this fact doing some damage to
Miller's position, whether it can be used by conservative nationalists to appeal to the state with
regard to immigration is doubtful. In order to do so they would not only have to assume
weakly that the institutions of state can manage the character and numbers of immigrants but,
more strongly, that only the institutions of state can do so. This, however, is an argument that is
yet to be made. Indeed, it would seem that, equipped with the appropriate set of freedoms to
pick and choose among other things neighbours and colleagues - that is, to discriminate individuals acting within the liberal institutions of civil society could do this in a manner that is
more sensitive to the values and traditions already latent in society, something which one would
expect to be in tune with the deepest philosophical commitments of conservatism.
A deeper problem here, moreover, is that the conservative nationalist can always
respond that our sense of national identity only changes over time because it is set within
permissive and corrosive liberal institutions. This response, of course, makes Miller’s critique
appear circular. He moves from the claim that national identity is subject to change to the
conclusion that we need the institutions of the liberal state to manage that change. Yet, the
conservative nationalist may reply that it is only because those institutions are specifically
liberal ones that the national identity changes in the first place. However, as we have seen, this
response ultimately has little impact for it presupposes that there actually is a given, identifiable
national identity that remains unchanging. Yet, the record of history is full of examples of
regimes being forced to change or being removed from within because of their failure to
understand the social forces around them. Conservatives may be wary of revolution as Burke
famously was but that does not stop revolutions from taking place. Miller’s point, then, is that
54
See On Nationality p. 181 for this particularist view with respect to civic education.
18
liberal institutions enable us to avoid the more unsavoury consequences of revolutions by
allowing the dissatisfaction and resentment that fuel them to be expressed and brought into the
political sphere.
Of course, one issue where we may concur with Miller is in his charge that conservative
nationalists presuppose an ossified or essentialist account of (national) identity. Indeed, in this
regard it seems that the only philosophical difference between the multicultural and
conservative nationalist position here is one of the number of identities that should be
recognized and protected by the state. That is, whereas multiculturalists, or at least the most
sincere amongst them, seek a politics that enables a myriad of groups to assert their identities,
conservative nationalists just think that only one such group should be allowed to do this, the
national group. Yet, as Miller claims in On Nationality, the multicultural argument that unlike
national identities, group identities are natural and authentic is simply untrue; all identities are to
a certain extent impure, inauthentic and the results of imposition from above. 55 If, moreover,
identity is forever in flux, conservative nationalists have no greater claim to the preservation of
just one identity than the multiculturalists have to preserve a diversity of them. Ultimately,
then, we may claim that conservative nationalism errs when it seeks, like multiculturalism, to
institutionalise an end to the cultural process, as if somehow society’s cultural problem has been
resolved. Instead of presupposing what the optimal relationship between the diverse members
of society, or between host and immigrant communities is or, for that matter, to which
institutions we should defer, we should forge institutions that leave us free to discover what
these might be in line with the embedded, tradition-bound nature of our identities.
Moreover, and similarly to the liberal nationalist position, it is reasonable to claim that
conservative nationalism does not capture what it is about nationalism today that makes it so
attractive to so many.
This, however, is not so much in connection with the fact that
conservatives seek to defend the integrity of the national identity with more gusto than, say,
liberal nationalists. Rather, it is in the overly traditionalistic account of the content of national
identity that conservatives presuppose. This is made clear, moreover, once the content of the
national identity that conservatives seek to defend cashed out in terms of particular issues. Most
notably, the conservative attitude towards race, gender and sexuality whilst always being
attractive to some, is viewed by many if not most citizens of contemporary liberal democracies
as being on the margins of contemporary opinion.
3. New Wave Nationalism: Nationalism’s Third Way?
Thus far we have claimed that the politics of culture and identity is by no means the preserve of
the left. Those on the right of politics can and do couch their policy preferences in terms of
55
ibid., pp. 132-5.
19
culture. To this end, we have looked at the two standard accounts of nationalist political
thought to see how this is so yet we have claimed that neither of these accounts adequately
explains why contemporary nationalism is so appealing.
In the case of Miller’s liberal
nationalist theory it is doubtful that the principal reason for the current attractiveness of
nationalism is because society is concerned with social justice or the transformation of national
identity.
Indeed, we have suggested that ultimately the instrumental account of liberal
nationality betrays the ultimately distributive rather than cultural concerns of the politic sit
supports. Rather, it seems that nationalism’s vitality is more likely rooted at least in part,
precisely in a regret about the changes and transformations that have taken place in the West
during the post-war era as a result of mass migration and with post-September 11 feelings of
insecurity. In this respect, it is the conservative nationalist elemental concern with the integrity
of national identity that would appear to be a more adequate explanation.
Yet, we have also claimed that one must be careful not to overplay the appeal of
conservatism here. Whilst the cultural explanation of the new found popularity of nationalism
rings true to a greater extent than the social democratic one, there is much elsewhere in the
conservative agenda with which few have ideological empathy.56 The new nationalism, then,
appears to be a mixture of the two positions: conservative, if not at times decidedly militant in
its desire to protect national identity as a good in itself, yet liberal-minded in the bulk of its
views on the substance of that identity and the national life it supports. Moreover, what is
particularly noteworthy about new wave nationalism is that not only can culture be invoked by
the right, but that right-wing cultural policies can be justified in terms of arguments normally
considered the preserve of the left.
That is, in many respects new wave nationalism
appropriates the discourse and terminology of the multicultural left and appeal to notions of
democracy, equity, cultural survival and the iniquities of exclusion and privilege in its critiques
of both multiculturalism and immigration. This new, almost post-modern, form of nationalist
argument represents, then, a most fundamental reworking of political discourse and destabilises
in a profound way our received notions of what it means to be on the cultural right.
3.i Inclusion as Assimilation, Exclusion for Democracy
Let us now look at a number of issues to get a better idea of what new wave nationalism is and
how it engages in cultural politics form the right by appropriating much of the political
vocabulary of the left. The issues that we will examine are democracy, multiculturalism,
discrimination and cultural survival. The argument presented by new wave nationalism with
regard to democracy is twofold. The first aspect relates to the satisfaction of democratic values
56
Indicative here is the view of Gerolf Annemans, the head of the right-wing Flemish nationalist Vlaams
Blok party in the Belgian National Assembly who stated that the Blok ‘was not opposed to legal
cohabitation of homosexuals’. Bryant, Elizabeth, ‘The Battle over Same-Sex Marriage’, San Francisco
Chronicle, San Francisco, March 15, 2004.
20
within the institutions of state whilst the second is concerned with the democratic character of
the national culture itself. Defenders of difference-based politics often couch their arguments in
terms of democratic values.57 We need a politics of difference in order to be fully democratic
and in order to ensure that minority groups have a say in decisions that affect them. However, it
is significant to note that this argument for a politics of difference can be put forward by those
who favour a politics of assimilation. Thus, whilst the multicultural left defends a differencebased account of politics so as to make good on the promise of democracy, new wave
nationalists defend an assimilationist politics on the same grounds. Without a politics of
assimilation, that is, immigrants will be ill-equipped to operate effectively within the host
society.58
At the level of policy this translates into the claim that immigrants should be
compelled to learn the host community’s language as a condition of their gaining citizenship
and to adopt over time its customs. The benefit of this, moreover, is not only for the immigrants
themselves whom without assimilation would be confused and marginalised, but also for the
cohesiveness of inter-communal relations as a whole, an argument that was central in the French
Government’s defence of laicité with respect to religious symbolism in public schools.
Of course, for some the actions such as those taken by the French government with
regard to religious symbolism does not address the core problem. ‘The debate about religious
symbolism’, commented Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of France’s Front National, ‘reminds me of
that about the sex of angels. The Orthodox hierarchy was quibbling about obscure points of
doctrine whilst Mohammed's troops were preparing to storm the Byzantine Empire.’59 What this
comment makes clear is that the protection of democratic values is for new wave nationalists
not only a matter of internal policy.
That is, for the sake of the values that democracy
represents, the state must not only pursue a politics of assimilation rather than multiculturalism
internally, but must on occasion follow policies of exclusion with respect to immigrants whose
cultural backgrounds are deemed incompatible with, or even hostile towards, those of the host
community. Thus, the politics of exclusion for the sake of democracy addresses the issue of the
health of the values that are so central to the functioning of democracy itself. For new wave
nationalists, liberal democratic culture only functions effectively, indeed only survives if the
populace holds it in high esteem and if it can exclude those whose values are inimical to it.
Such a view, of course, was central to Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn’s concerns when he
claimed that further Muslim immigration into the Netherlands should be halted because
‘Christianity and Judaism have gone through the laundromat of humanism and enlightenment,
57
On this see Young, I. M., Justice and the Politics of Difference; Inclusion for Democracy; Philips, A.,
The Politics of Presence, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1995.
58
A point expressed by British Labour MP Ann Cryer who claimed that without such assimilationist
measures immigration policy amounted to little more than the importation of poverty. The Guardian,
Manchester, 17 July, 2001.
59
Le Point, Paris, 16 January,.
21
but this is not the case with Islam’.60 Politicians such as Fortuyn claimed that the state needs to
adopt a restrictive stance toward immigration not because it is intolerant, racist or insensitive to
difference per se but in order to protect the secular, democratic values that are central to
Western societies and to which many of the non-Western immigrants who make up by far the
largest proportion of the contemporary inflow appear to be indifferent, if not overtly hostile. An
example of such hostility occurred in London when a mayoral election meeting organised by
Operation Black Vote - a community organization working to encourage ethnic minority
participation in the democratic process - had to be abandoned after Muslim protestors objecting
to the presence of leading UK gay rights advocate Peter Tatchell invaded the hall.61
In stark contrast to much multicultural theory, then, we may term this Fortuynesque
argument as one of exclusion for the sake of democracy. We may note, furthermore, that unlike
Miller who remains conspicuously silent with regard to what should happen if immigrants do
not accept current political structures, new wave nationalists are prepared to make hard policy
choices to ensure that they do or to prevent them form penetrating the boundaries of the state if
they do not. It seems, then, that despite the incompatibility of their policy prescriptions, both
multiculturalism and new wave nationalism may appeal to the value of democracy in support of
them.62
3.ii Domination: Multiculturalism as the new racism
Of course, one way of separating multiculturalism and new wave nationalism would be to claim
that multiculturalism is rooted in a deeper concern with inequality and processes of power and
domination within society that lead minority and vulnerable communities to be marginalised by
the wider community. That is, defenders of a difference-based account of politics argue that it
is needed to combat processes of domination and oppression that leave members of minority
communities unable to lead fulfilling lives.63 For new wave nationalists, however, it is the very
edifice of multiculturalism itself that is all too often the engine of such processes so far as
member of majority communities are concerned. Thus, it is claimed that majority communities
carry the burden of multiculturalism's injunction that the diverse cultures of society - except the
majority one - be protected and even celebrated and that consequently multiculturalism should
be done away with. In many towns in the North West of England, for example, it is precisely
the perception that the national community is being ignored by governments who appear to be
60
The Guardian, London, 05 July, 2002.
‘Tatchell flees Muslim abuse’, The Pink Paper, London, 05 May, 2000
62
A similar argument has been made by Bruce Ackerman who, despite viewing national boundaries and
the luck that comes to those born within those of prosperous countries as morally arbitrary and hence in
need of equalisation through free movement, claims that we need immigration controls to protect liberal
values, that is, to maintain ‘a cadre of natives familiar with the operation of liberal institutions’.
Ackerman, B., Social Justice in the Liberal State, New Haven, Yale University Press, 1980, p. 94.
63
On this see Young, I. M., Justice and the Politics of Difference; Inclusion and Democracy, Oxford,
Oxford University Press, 2000.
61
22
more concerned with the well being of immigrant and minority communities insofar as the
targeting of community project funding and welfare is concerned that has lead in recent years to
record levels of support for the British National Party.64
Fundamental to maintaining popular support for any public policy agenda in a
democracy, of course, is public opinion and it is here where new wave nationalists makes
another complaint. Two cases are of particular relevance here. In the first, approximately 2000
supporters of the anti-multicultural and anti-immigration Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party in
Australia had their names and home addresses published by the Australia-Israel and Jewish
Affairs Council four month prior to the 1998 general election.65 Moreover, in the UK MPs who
refused to sign a pledge promising to avoid the use of language likely to whip up racial hatred
during the 2001 general election campaign were publicly named on the UK Commission for
Racial Equality’s (CRE) website. The problem here was twofold. In the first instance, it would
always be a matter of controversy as to what would constitute language likely to whip up racial
hatred. Indeed, for many the determination of such matters is precisely what democratic politics
is for rather than within the remit of an unaccountable public body.
Thus, when any
organisation attempts to steer the course of public debate on an important issue, it unavoidably
appears to be attempting to control the debate and in the process usurping the role of politics
itself. The second issue, of course, is the fact of the publication of the names of those MPs who
refused to sign the pledge. The problem here is that there are probably as many possible
reasons for refusal as there are people who refuse. Yet, by publishing names in this manner the
CRE appeared to be condemning people in advance as guilty of racism.
Taken together, these events communicated in no uncertain terms that not only would
the formation of political parties sceptical of immigration and multiculturalism be hindered, but
that even if those sympathetic to the politics of assimilation managed to get elected, their voices
would be constrained in any case.
New wave nationalists complain that supporters of
multiculturalism resort to undemocratic and even antidemocratic strategies to make sure that
public discourse is conducted in terms favourable to their particular political agenda.
Yet the new wave nationalist complaint about the dominating effects of multiculturalism is not
only about the distortion of the democratic process. The very architecture of society itself is
part of the process. For example, the erection in north London in 2003 of an eruv - a notional
boundary within which Orthodox Jews can perform tasks otherwise banned on the Sabbath and
comprised in this particular case of 84 telegraph poles standing 30ft high, positioned beside
roads and houses and connected with 1,000 metres of fishing line to help define the boundary caused controversy as it was perceived as turning a public space into a quasi-private one. Other
arguments against it were numerous and of a distinctly progressive nature, ranging from a
64
65
The BNP gained over 800,000 votes at this year’s European Elections.
Australia/Israel Review, Australia-Israel and Jewish Affairs Council, July 1998.
23
concern that local flora and fauna, particularly birds, may be injured by the wires, to the
unsightliness of the poles, to violation of freedom of conscience to the fact that the construction
of the eruv was a ‘a claim for territory’ that was ‘extremely offensive to the majority of people
who live in the borough, who are of all religions and none.’66 Similarly, the decision by a local
government committee to rename a ward in the ancient London district of Spitalfields as
Spitalfields and Banglatown in order to acknowledge the presence of significant numbers of
Bangladeshi immigrants as well as to encourage tourism was seen as dominating. This was
particularly so because the district in question is famous for its history of immigration, ranging
from French Huguenots in the seventeenth century to Ashkenazi Jews in the nineteenth. Yet, it
was pointed out, Spitalfields was not renamed to accommodate either of these communities.
Indeed, in this regard the very name Spitalfields is itself synonymous with the idea of
hospitality to immigrants and it was in this sense that many argued that the traditional name
should have been respected.
For new wave nationalists what such examples often communicate is a colonising
mentality in which place names are often the first victims, a practice which was widespread
during the era of global expansion by western European powers. Indeed, the idea that
immigrants often only seem to be interested in setting up colonies and of living unintegrated or
‘parallel lives’ within the host society was acknowledged in the official independent report into
race riots that took place between ethnically English and Muslim Asian youth across northwest
England in June 2001.67
Another example of domination comes not from the physical manifestations of
multiculturalism but from the consequences of diversity itself, particularly with regard to
women. In this case however, the consequences at issue are not those for minority women - of
which Doriane Lambelet Coleman and Seyla Benhabib’s discussions are particularly instructive
- but for women from national communities.68 In many high immigration areas today it is not
uncommon for majority community women to be subjected to verbal and other forms of abuse
for wearing clothing that leaves parts of their bodies uncovered. In Australia, moreover, there
have been a number of high-profile gang-rape trials in which the majority ethnic background of
the victim was a significant factor in the motivation for the attack.69 Even more disturbingly, in
Lydall, Ross, ‘Jewish Move Sparks Criticism,’ Evening Standard, London, 02 August 2002.
On this see Community Cohesion: A Report of the Independent Review Team, Community Cohesion
Unit, UK Home Office, 2003.
68
On this see Coleman, L. L., ‘Individualizing Justice through Multiculturalism: The Liberals’ Dilemma’,
Columbia Law Review, vol. 96 no. 5, June 1996, pp. 1093 – 1167; Benhabib, S., The Claims of Culture,
pp. 86 - 91.
69
Toy, Naomi & Knowles, Lorna, ‘Pack rapists’ racial taunts’, Sydney, The Sydney Morning Herald, 24
August, 2001; Devine, Miranda, ‘Racist rapes: finally the truth comes out’, Sydney, The Sun-Herald, 14
July, 2002; Sheehan, Paul, Racist to deny the truth of rape’, Sydney, Sydney Morning Herald’, Sydney,
Sydney Morning Herald, 19 April, 2003; Devine, Miranda, ‘Betraying the rape victims’, Sydney, The
Sun-Herald, 30 November, 2003
66
67
24
at least one of these trials, the culture of the accused was used in their defence.70 This argument,
both Coleman and Benhabib explain, is often called the ‘cultural defence’ strategy and involves
the defence presenting cultural evidence as an excuse for an otherwise criminal act. Moreover,
far from being dismissed by the courts, the production of this evidence has on some occasions
been accompanied by reduced sentences and acquittals, particularly if the victim is a member of
the same minority community as the defendant.71 Now, whilst there is no recorded case of a
minority defendant successfully appealing to the cultural defence strategy with respect to a
majority victim, the potential for this to occur s real. Moreover, this raises the important issue
of discrimination insofar as majority defendants cannot by definition appeal to the cultural
defence strategy for the norms of their culture are already implicit in the legal systems to which
they are subject. Not only, then, as Benhabib and Coleman correctly point out, does the strategy
of cultural defence undermine aspects of the multicultural agenda itself ‘because minority
victims or minority perpetrators do not have access to the same justice as all victims of majority
perpetrators’, but, as they inexplicably fail to point out it would also mean that majority
perpetrators do not have access to the same justice as minority perpetrators.72
3.iii Discrimination
Next is the new wave nationalist complaint about the discriminatory nature of antidiscrimination measures. Of course, one of the important factors in determining whether a
practice is discriminatory or not is whether it affects known others.
In this way, anti-
discrimination advocates seek to outlaw many forms of discrimination on the basis of race,
gender, religion and sexuality. Yet, it could be equally consistent to outlaw arranged marriages
as these invariably select life partners on the grounds of religion with the consequence that
known others are systematically rejected on a discriminatory basis. This, of course, is yet to
happen and the fact that it has not leads to the claim that anti-discrimination practice is
necessarily selective and hence discriminatory with respect to the social outcomes it seeks to
eradicate.
An interesting example of the discriminatory effects of multiculturalism itself comes
from the workplace and, more specifically, workplace dress codes. In contrast to the example
above where in the interests of anti-discrimination communities have to shoulder the burden of
a practice that is only prevalent within a handful of them, this example moves in the opposite
direction. That is, only some types of community are able, to enjoy the protection of antidiscrimination measures rather than others. Importantly, the complaint here is not the more
common one of anti-discrimination measures being examples of ‘reverse discrimination’ which
Wallace, Natasha, ‘Gang rapists told age, culture no defence’, Sydney, The Sydney Morning Herald, 02
March, 2004;
71
Although it is not clear from Benhabib’s discussion whether the cultural defence strategy was solely
responsible for them.
72
Benhabib, S., The Claims of Culture, p.???
70
25
is often directed at affirmative action measures. Rather, the complaint proceeds from the
premiss that an anti-discrimination measure is uncontroversial, but that it is applied unfairly to
the disadvantage of particular groups.
In one workplace it was decided that a new female Muslim employee should be allowed
to wear a headscarf in the office. The reasons given were respect for her understanding of the
requirements her religion placed upon her in terms of appearance. Some weeks after this, a
position for a new receptionist arose at the company and after a round of interviews it was
decided that the best candidate was an ethnically English male. He was offered the position but
only conditionally. The condition was that he remove the piercing above his eyebrow as it was
not appropriate to the position he had been chosen for.
In the first instance, new wave nationalists complain that it is arbitrary to conclude that
one form of cultural expression is appropriate whilst another is not. One could respond here,
however, that to put the issue in these terms is misleading. We are not dealing with only
cultural forms of expression but, rather, with religion. Yet this seems only to shift the question
to the issue of why religion should be accorded some privileged status relative to other forms of
cultural expression - in this case, we may say relative to youth cultural expression. This is all
the more strange, new wave nationalists contend, when religion itself plays such a limited or
non-existent role in the majority of people’s lives in contemporary liberal democracies.
One answer is that youth culture is, unlike religion, but a bundle of freely chosen fads, a
passing phase which will eventually be grown out of. The practices central to religion, by
contrast, are often obligatory and of long standing. Yet, even here there is good reason to be
sceptical of the special claims of religion. In the first instance piercing is not the preserve of the
young. Yet, in any case, it is questionable that the transient nature of the practice is a relevant
factor. At the time the piercing may have been a part of the young person’s journey of selfdiscovery and, no less of his identity. In any case, both the religion itself and the particular
practices associated with it are no less the subjects of personal choice. Of course it is at this
point where defenders of religious exemption claim that they have no choice because the
doctrines to which they subscribe demand it, or because the practice is a central and unalterable
aspect of their identity. Yet, if this is so, how do we account for the facts of conversion,
renunciation and schism? It may be the case that certain aspects of the religion are obligatory
but subscribing to a particular religion is not. The free-choice obligation argument is one to
which defenders of multiculturalism cannot appeal in order to rebut the new wave nationalist
charge of discriminatory anti-discrimination.
Another avenue which defenders of the religious exemption may pursue is that of the
profundity and meaningfulness of the practices concerned. This, of course, is the converse of
the ‘fad’ argument and claims that, even if the motivation for piercing one’s eyebrow is
sincerely held, unlike the donning of the headscarf, it is a superficial practice. Yet, this too
26
seems only to reflect a rather shallow understanding of culture and cultural practice itself. For
the piercing itself can, on at least one reading, reflect some of the most profound elements of
liberal secular culture, although these may be elements which the piercer is not consciously
aware of. That is, the piercing represents not only the attaining of adulthood and the freedom to
choose that this implies, but goes to the heart of what it means to be, we may say, an individual
chooser. What often disguises this fact is that there is no official doctrine, book or godly Author
to sanction the practice. That is, the ethical reference point for both adopting a practice and for
deciding what the practice should be resides in the person of the chooser himself. But this does
not make the practice any less meaningful. Indeed, in contrast to much religious practice which
seems very often to be but the result of either habit, superstition or communal imposition, the
liberal chooser confers a unique moral authority upon the practice he adopts through the simple
exercise of choice itself. There is little that is more reflective of liberalism for new wave
nationalists, then, than the youth with the pierced eyebrow for new wave nationalists. To
discriminate against him from within a liberal culture and on the grounds of liberal values of
toleration and respect for difference is little short of perverse, let alone unjust and, ultimately,
self-contradictory.
3.iv Cultural Survival
Another familiar claim from multicultural and difference theory is that without a politics of
difference or recognition, vulnerable minorities will be submerged in the majority culture,
leaving their members confused and deracinated and unable to voice their distinctive
perspective in public deliberation.73 Similarly, however, the same argument is made on behalf
of members of majority and host communities is areas with high migrant intake.
The
underlying issue here and it is one that both camps share, is the issue of the importance of
cultural identity to individual well-being.74 On the one hand multiculturalists claim that because
culture is so central to individual identity, we need to institute a multicultural politics to protect
vulnerable minorities. Similarly, new wave nationalists claim that precisely because cultural
identity is so important, it is necessary that the state takes measure to ensure the well-being and
survival of the national culture that is so central to the well-being of the majority, indigenous
population.
The claim gains credibility with the fact that in many western cities today
immigrants do not appear to wish to adapt to the host society in any way at all, a fact perhaps
most evidenced in their retention of traditional forms of dress and a failure to learn the language
of the majority community.
On this see Taylor, C., ‘Multiculturalism: the politics of recognition’, In Taylor, C., and Gutmann, A.,
???,??? ???
74
A systematic investigation of which is to be found in Kymlicka, W., Liberalism, Community and
Culture, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1989
73
27
In itself, of course, this does not necessarily imply any major problem. Western liberal
democracies have always known and tolerated dissent. However, this issue returns again to the
question of numbers and the idea of national identities, like all identities, being imagined
identities. The problem here, of course, is not just the fact that an unwillingness to adapt to
local customs and norms may be experienced as offensive to members of host and majority
communities, nor even that such outward signs of indifference to local customs only fuel the
host communities reluctance to extend inclusion into its imagined identity to such newcomers.
Rather, the problem is made particularly acute when incomers arrive in such numbers as to
begin to outnumber the locals. At this point, the nature of the community thoroughly changes to
the point where those doing the imagining, imagine in a completely and often incompatible way
to the indigenous population and, quite possibly, to the exclusion of the idea of toleration of
dissent and difference.75
The problem here, of course is that in a very significant sense the very fact of diversity
itself represents the negation of the indigenous culture, when that culture is a largely
homogenous one. The argument behind the denial of this claim is that multiculturalism allows
indigenous and migrant cultures to co-exist and does so, moreover, on an equitable basis. Yet to
the extent that the definition of culture extends not only to belief but, as we have emphasised, to
dress, food, music, language and architecture, this is simply untrue. Culture, that is, is not
something we only carry in our heads. It infuses the physical realm itself and therefore has
tangible consequences for the integrity of the host community culture.
4. Conclusion
The aim of this paper has been twofold. In the first instance it has been to make the
claim that a concern with the politics of identity is not the preserve of the multicultural left. A
concern with identity, that is, is also important to much nationalist thought, whether it is of the
liberal instrumentalist or conservative constitutive variety. Yet, we have also claimed that the
traditional understanding of nationalist thought in liberal or conservative terms is an inadequate
one. In contemporary politics at least, much nationalist thought does not seem to be about
securing the political conditions for the achievement of social justice, less still the institutional
prerequisites for the transformation of national identity. Neither, moreover, does this mean that
nationalists are overly attached to a traditionalistic, hierarchical account of identity. Indeed, in
many important respects, much of contemporary nationalist sentiment appears to embody a
desire to protect liberal values and freedoms from forces deemed hostile to them. Perhaps even
more paradoxically and despite its hostility to multiculturalism at the level of policy, we have
75
Importantly, in smaller nations such as Flanders and Denmark, the feeling that the indigenous culture is
becoming increasingly marginalized is all the more keenly felt. For such nations, cultural diversity
represents not the flowering of many cultures within society but the submergence of an alreadyvulnerable national community.
28
also seen that the new wave politics of national identity often justifies its normative conclusions
in terms that are very similar to its leftist rival. The politics of identity, then, is a far more
complex politics than is often acknowledged in contemporary political theory.
The second, more practical, aim has been to set out the new wave nationalist position in
order to fill a gap in the political theory of nationalism as well as in philosophical discourse
concerning the political implications of culture and identity more generally. This, we may add,
is all the more important because despite gaining significant ground politically in many Western
democracies in the wake of the atrocities of September 11th 2001, the concerns of what we have
called new wave nationalism are yet to be formulated in any systematic way within political
theory. By attempting to do so here, I hope to have not only to have achieved this but also to
have opened up, if not a new research project, then at least a new avenue of enquiry within the
political theory of nationalism. Whether, of course, new wave nationalism is a philosophically
coherent position, or whether it is morally defensible, are two further questions which, I hope,
this paper has succeeded in planting in the mind of the reader.
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