Kenyan Nationalism: The Presence of the Nation-State and Cultivation of National Identity in Colonial East Africa During World War II
In conclusion, it would be helpful to offer a provisional definition of nationalism and follow it up with products of this analysis concerning the influence of the nation-state on its development. Nationalism is an emergent ideological system, understood most accurately within the context of the unique conceptual mechanisms which enable its function. From a broad standpoint, humans, first, have a unique capacity for solidarity with others whom they believe co-determine the well-being of a whole for which both oneself and another are a part.16 The "well-being of the whole," in this way, becomes implicated in the well-being of each of its constituent parts. This capacity for solidarity, in its most base form, is both natural and should be understood as value-neutral.17
Following from this basic predisposition, nationalism then manifests itself, when this solidarity is exhibited on behalf of the nation-state as the whole and the other citizens who similarly populate that whole.18 This is not to say that ideas or theories as to "what will be best for the whole" will always look alike to those citizens inside.19 However, it is to say that nationalism begins from the sentiment that "what is good for the whole, is good for its corresponding parts."20 This is the step we see Itote take because of the presence of national bureaucratic structures that enable him to envision this type of expanded solidarity, and the threatening presence of other nation-states that require the resources of a nation-state to defend one's own interests. Without the presence of the modern colonial nation-state, and Itote's involvement in the war of imperial nations, it is unclear whether the appeal of a national identity and independence would have ever developed. The final conceptual step—which we later see developing within Africa, in the same modalities with which it spread throughout the Western world—reifies nationalism into the territory of a more familiar patriotic or even jingoistic pride (with which we are more familiar in its usage): the conclusion that one's superiority over others (in this case, we are refering to state agents) also ensures the superior agent's potential for improving general well-being of its parts. Rather than pointing us away from the conclusions here, this final conceptual step in fact serves to highlight the insidious reality of the presence of the nation-state, because of its capacity—as we see in Itote—to inflame nationalism through the constant perceived threat of a more powerful outside agent, and catalyze the underlying competitive force vivifying the modern nation-state.
footnotes
Brubaker, “Myths and Misconceptions in the Study of Nationalism.”, 279: "On a more philosophical level, we arrive here at the inescapable antinomies of national self-determination. Self-determination presupposes the prior determination of the unit—the national self—that is to enjoy the right of self-determination. But the identification and boundaries of this self cannot themselves be self-determined: they must be determined by others. Just as the boundaries of the demos that is presupposed by democratic institutions cannot themselves be democratically determined, so too the boundaries of the national self that is presupposed by national selfdetermination cannot themselves be self-determined." This is consonant with what is explored here, and emphasizes, in pre-modern instances, how the relationship between the state and its constituency can be obfuscated by conflating the self-determination of the state with the originating co-determinative capacity that exists in individuals which gives rise to the group and eventually the self-determining state. Only after the structures and institutions of the nation-state, imported into colonial Africa in the case of Itote, give the appearance of the capacity for nationalistic self-determination does he become aware of this modern capacity of state arrangement; cf. Hutchinson and Smith, (1995), 18: "A great aggregation of men, with a healthy spirit and warmth of heart, creates a moral conscience which is called a nation. When this moral conscience proves its strength by sacrifices that demand abdication of the individual for the benefit of the community, it is legitimate, and it has a right to exist." ↩
Brubaker, “Myths and Misconceptions in the Study of Nationalism.”, 278: "Nationalism, then, should not be conceived as essentially or even as primarily state-seking. Nor, as Gellner emphasised, should it be understood as nation-based, that is as arising from the demands of nations, understood as real, substantial, bounded social entities." ↩
Hutchinson and Smith, (1995), 22: Weber begins from the same general sentiment, "In the sense of those using the term at a given time, the concept undoubtedly means, above all, that only may exact from certain gropus of men a specific sentiment of solidarity in the face of other groups. [...] Yet, there is no agrement on how these groups should be delimited or about what concerted action should result from such solidarity." ↩
Brubaker, “Myths and Misconceptions in the Study of Nationalism.”, 274: "The principle of nationality asserts that state and nation should be congruent; it thereby provides a powerful lever for evaluating, and redrawing, state boundaries, for legitimating, or delegitimating political frontiers according to a kind of 'correspondance theory' of justice." Justice, for example, can be perceived in a variety of ways by different national groups be it economic, territorial or otherwise. ↩
Hutchinson and Smith, (1995), 21: Weber's account enhances the generality of this statement with more precise examples: "In addition to the direct and material imperialist interests, discussed above, there are partly indiret and material and partly idological interests of strate that are in various ways intellectually privileged within a polity and, indeed, privileged by its very existence. ↩
references
- Mau Mau General — Journal of African History bibliographic record for Waruhiu Itote's autobiography used in the essay
- Colonial administration records: Kenya — UK National Archives guide to colonial records on Kenya, the Mau Mau insurgency, and the transition to independence
- Nationalism — Bibliographic record for the Hutchinson and Smith reader cited in the note
- Myths and Misconceptions in the Study of Nationalism — Publisher record for Rogers Brubaker's chapter and its correct book container
- Nationalist Mobilization and the Collapse of the Soviet State — Publisher record for Mark R. Beissinger's book cited in the note