Nationhood,Communism and State Legitimation

Abstract. Four states have disappeared as a result of the collapse of communism and many others have come into being. I want to look at the reason why these states have disappeared, what this says about the nature of state-sustaining ideologies and what the disappearance tells us about the relationship between statehood and nationhood. I will also look at the effectiveness of communism as a state-sustaining ideology. The four are, obviously, the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and East Germany. In each case, the survival of the state was linked to communism and the end of communism brought their continued existence into jeopardy. I shall not be looking at the Soviet Union in detail. Broadly, the construction of political identities can come about in two ways – by ethnicity or by the state. Each gives rise to a different set of loyalties, creates its own panoply of rituals etc. When the two coincide, the mythical nation-state can be said to be in being, but this hardly exists in reality (Iceland may be the sole exception in Europe).     

Book reviews

THE MIND OF EAST ASIA, Lily Abegg. (338 pp. with Index). Translated from the German. Thames and Hudson; London, New York.

BRITAIN AND THE UNITED STATES: Problems in Co‐operation. A joint report prepared by Henry L. Roberts and Paul A. Wilson. London. Royal Institute of International Affairs. Pp. 224. Price 8/6 sterling. 1953.

D?R LAUTLOSE AUFSTAND. BERICHT VEBER DIE WIDER‐STANDSBEWEGUNG DES DEUTSCHEN VOLKES 1933–1945. Herausgegeben von Guenther Weissenborn. Rowohlt Verlag Hamburg. Pp. 348.

“EASTERN AND WESTERN WORLD”: Selected Readings with a foreword by S. Hofstra. Issued under the auspices of the Netherlands Foundation for International Co‐operation and published by W. Van Hoeve Ltd., The Hague, Bandung. 1953. Pp. 181.

NATIONALISM AND SOCIAL COMMUNICATION. By Karl W. Deutsch. John Wiley & Sons, N. Y. viii and 292.

BURMA UNDER THE JAPANESE: By Thakin Nu. Pictures and Portraits, Edited and translated with Introduction by J. S. Furnivall. Macmillan, London. 1954. Pp. xxviii and 132. Price 12s 6d.

COMMODITY TRADE AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT—Report of a Committee appointed by the Secretary‐General, United Nations, Published by the United Nations, 1953.