Understanding Nationalism

In the struggle to win the minds of the working class, the Socialist Party has had to contend with the deeply held and unquestioned belief of nationalism ― the loyalty felt by many members of the working class to "their country", the geo-political unit in which they happen to be born. Patriots hold the view that a "nation" consists of a hierarchy of men and women who, although having differing incomes, social status, and power, all have a common interest in working in harmony for the benefit of the country as a whole and, if necessary, in fighting against other nations to defend this interest. They prefer instead to see history as a succession of struggles of nations against foreign domination, of subjects against tyrannical kings and of nations and races against each other.

Broadly speaking, nationalism represents the interests of the capitalist class. Nationalism can take on a "right-wing" or a "left-wing" form, although every nationalist believe themselves to be unique. This depends upon the position of the capitalist class in the particular time and place. If political power is held by the aristocracy or nobility, and the middle-class is struggling to assert itself, then nationalism will have "left-wing" connotations. This was the case in Europe until 1848 when nationalism was a romantic, revolutionary force against the traditional ruling class. However, once the aspiring ruling class have captured and consolidated its power, then nationalism becomes a conservative and right wing.

The Socialist Party opposes all nationalist movements recognising that the working class has no country. We give no support to any nationalist. There are certain others, the so-called left-nationalists who fully accept the mythology of the existence of "the nation". argued that Marx and Engels supported nationalist movements and that therefore "socialists" should do so today. Such an assertion is based on a faulty understanding of the materialist conception of history. Marx and Engels were living in an era when the rising capitalist class was engaged in a struggle to assert itself against the old feudal regimes. The victory of this class was a historically progressive step at that time in that it brought about the re-organisation of society on a capitalist basis, the essential precondition for the establishment of Socialism; and it created an urban proletariat, the only class which can bring about socialism. This was why Marx supported the capitalists in their bid to capture political power. However, once capitalism reaches the point where socialism is a practical proposition, there is no need for socialists to advocate the capitalist industrialization of every corner of the globe; they can concentrate fully on the task of establishing socialism.

The Socialist Party is a Marxist organisation and we accept the main points of Karl Marx's theories of history, economics, and politics. But not uncritically. One of our disagreements with Marx is over nationalism. Marx and Engels had declared that workers have no country and urged the workers of the world to unite, this was not their only statement on the matter. They also made a distinction between "historical nations" (such as Poland and Ireland) and "non-historical nations" (such as the Czechs, Scots, and Welsh). Historical nations met with their approval because, as independent states, they could be progressive in terms of capitalist development. Non-historical nations, on the other hand, were doomed to be assimilated into the more progressive states (with "democracy as compensation", as Engels put it). Non-historical nations were not viable as independent states in a capitalist world, argued Marx and Engels, and any movement for state independence in such nations could only be reactionary.

Nationalism has served to divide workers into different nation-states not only literally but ideologically. Today it is probably fair to say that a majority of workers—to one extent or another—align themselves to their domestic ruling class. Historically, nationalism and national feeling have been the tool of the capitalist class for both winning and retaining power. The ruling class have cultivated such ideas as nationalism, propagating the illusion that we live in a society with a collective social interest. The more enlightened capitalists probably saw the effects of separating and alienating people from each other and their labour, and so stepped up the spreading of beliefs like nationalism in order to try and convince people that they were not so exploited as they really were and that everyone had a common interest. Nationalism is a relatively new concept for social control, while before religion was once the principle method of control over the majority.

To the socialist, class-consciousness is the breaking-down of all barriers to understanding. The conflict between the classes is more than a struggle for each to gain from the other: it is the division which reaches across all others. The class-conscious worker knows where he or she stands in society. His or her interests are opposed at every point to those of the capitalist class. Nationalism is not their interest but their rulers'. The presence of nationalist ideas is an indication that some groups in society feel its real material interests are being frustrated by forces outside or even inside the nation. But the desire to achieve their aims is never expressed in terms of their own needs only. 

In order to enlist the necessary working class support such arguments as “justice”, “freedom”, and “the nation” are used to justify the real bone of contention and to give it an aura of sanctity. The concept of nationality, the idea that an area dominated by a privileged class which thrives on the enforced poverty of that area's productive class, should grant to the latter the right to live there providing its members accept their wage-slave status and endorse the right of the privileged to live on their backs is offensive to any intelligent person. Those who promote such nonsense are enemies of our class.

The Socialist Party say that no matter where our fellow-workers were born, wherever they live or wherever they come from, they should identify with people in a similar position throughout the world. “We” are all members of a world-wide excluded class of wage-working wealth producers – the world working class – who have a common interest in coming together to abolish so-called “nation-states” and establish a frontier-free world community in which all the natural and industrial resources of the Earth will have become the common heritage of all Humanity, to be used for the benefit instead of, as to today, to make profits for the few. Then we would all really be Citizens of the World, Earth-people.