On the Roles of Institutions and Agency in Nationalism and the Relations between Them: A Theoretical Enquiry into the Study of Nationalism,Its Present and Future

Introduction

It is apparent that the field of sociology has struggled to come to terms with nations and nationalism as a collective identity and doctrine, often seeming more comfortable with ‘class’ as a form of collective identity. In the first decade of the early 21st century, this seemed appropriate as nationalism appeared to be in decline. Sociologists were not called on to account for and explain nationalism. Instead, they were expected to contribute to an understanding of how and why nationalism had run its course. However, this changed with the second decade of the 21st century witnessing a sharp increase in nationalism. The emerging consensus that nationalism had run its course was replaced by the question of why nationalism continued to be relevant. This is an important question, demanding an answer from sociologists – and one that resonates with and testifies to the timeliness of this special issue (Gideon, 2019).

This article explores how sociology can contribute to an understanding of nationalism’s present and future. It begins this exploration with unfolding what sociology’s contribution to understanding the emergence and development of nationalism has been so far. In doing so, the article engages with the substantial body of literature on nations and nationalism within political sociology. Political sociologists are positioned at the intersection of state and society. Just as they work at different levels of analysis, they may differ in how they conceptualise ‘state’ and ‘society’. But they share a concern about issues such as nationalism, which are connected to the relationship between the state and society (Botelho, 2014; Hall and Brincker, 2019).

Looking back, we observe three debates in the sociology of nations and nationalism: an early debate that took place in the 1950s and 1960s between Elie Kedourie and Ernest Gellner; and a second debate in the 1980s and 1990s between the so-called ethnosymbolists, Anthony D Smith (1986, 1991, 2008) and John Hutchinson (1994), and the modernists, scholars such as Benedict Anderson (1983), John Breuilly (1993 [1982]), Rogers Brubaker (1992, 1996, 2004a), Ernest Gellner (1964, 1983) and John Hall (1998). In recent years, a third debate has emerged among scholars such as Sinisa Malesevic (2013, 2019), Andreas Wimmer (2002, 2013, 2018) and many more. Drawing on sociological theory and especially sociological institutional theory (Malesevic, 2013), this framework seeks to establish an analytical gaze that prioritises the roles of, and interactions between, institutions, organisations and agency in the making and unmaking of boundaries.

In the following sections, we will explore the roles of institutions and agency and the interaction between them. We engage with the agency of artists (composers) in the making and unmaking of boundaries among the Nordic countries in the process of forming a nation-state in the 19th century. In these two types of national projects we see different manifestations of roles and interactions between institutions and agency in the making and unmaking of boundaries. However, the objective of this endeavour is not to provide fully fledged case studies. This has been done elsewhere (Brincker, 2003, 2008, 2014; Brincker and Brincker, 2004). Instead, it is to critically explore the analytical framework and see the insights it generates when applied.

Albeit the aim is not to present a primary research paper, a few sentences on the selection of artists (composers) and sources are appropriate. The article draws upon secondary historical sources on national state formation in the Nordic countries, focusing especially on the history of music of the four countries. As we explore this theme, the idea of the nation-state obviously constitutes an important factor, establishing a basis for the study of national music traditions, of distinctively national styles, timbres and sounds, and of prominent national composers. In view of this, it is important to keep in mind that while studying classical music in a national context and analysing national composers, classical music is not simply a national phenomenon but, above all, a cross-cultural phenomenon that arises in, and under the influence of, international music scenes (Applegate and Potter, 2002; Brincker, 2008; Brincker and Brincker, 2004; Brincker and Leoussi, 2018; Leerssen, 2006; White and Murphy, 2001).

Thus, we delve deep into the agency of artists, more specifically the Danish, Finnish and Norwegian national composers par excellence: Niels W Gade (1817–1890), Edward Grieg (1843–1907) and Jean Sibelius (1865–1957), in the context of the national projects of the Nordic countries in the 19th century. The Danish case is in turn used to link to the Swedish case at key points, most notably on the point of the ‘Nordic tone’ (Jonsson and Tegen, 1992). We do so with the aim to explore interactions between institutions and agency in the context of these four national projects.

Initially, this article unfolds sociology’s contribution to our understanding of the emergence and development of nationalism. It offers a brief insight into the two first debates in nationalism studies, that is, the debate between Gellner and Kedourie (1950–1960s) and the debate between modernists and ethnosymbolists (1980s–1990s) before focusing on the third debate. Taking the recent contributions by two prominent scholars in the third debate, Malesevic (2019) and Wimmer (2018), as its point of departure, the article presents two claims and one counterclaim. Against this backdrop, the article offers three propositions that contribute to the understanding of nationalism’s present and future. The article engages with these three propositions empirically. In doing this, it turns to the Nordic countries to illustrate the insights they offer in the making and unmaking of boundaries in 19th-century Nordic countries, focusing especially on the interaction between institutions and the agency of artists. The article concludes with a brief discussion of its findings.

Debates One and Two in Studies on Nationalism

The early 1980s witnessed a massive increase in scholarly work on nationalism with publications by Anderson (1983), Gellner (1983), Hobsbawm and Ranger (1983) and Smith (1986). However, these scholars did not develop the field from the beginning. It is possible to identify three debates in the field of nationalism studies (Hearn, 2006; Özkirimli, 2000; Smith, 1998).

The first early debate was a normative debate about nationalism considered from the perspectives of normative political theory and historical sociology. It took place between Gellner and Elie Kedourie, both professors at the London School of Economics (LSE) in the 1950s and 1960s. They had fundamentally different views of, and approaches to, nationalism. Kedourie saw it as a continuation of pre-modern ties into the modern period while Gellner viewed nationalism as part of a fundamental break between pre-modern and modern (Gellner, 1964; Kedourie, 1960, 1971). The first debate also had normative elements connected to academics’ desire to distance themselves from nationalism. Nationalism had a bad reputation, with Kedourie especially disliking it. Gellner engaged with laying the foundations for the formal descriptive theory of nations and nationalism while hoping that cultural pluralism could be achieved within a larger political unit than the nation-state (Hall, 1998, 2010).

The second debate that took place in the 1980s and 1990s was influenced by the Gellner–Kedourie debates. It sought to consolidate studies of nationalism as an academic field that is not primarily concerned with normative considerations about nationalism. The second debate, while defined by contributions from sociologists and historians, also included scholars, most notably David Miller (1995, 2000), who explores nationalism from the perspective of normative political theory – although Miller’s approach is much more embracive of nationalism than his predecessors’ in the field. This means that while one can detect a tendency among Miller’s predecessors to reject nationalism on normative grounds, Miller engages with it. In doing this, Miller has in recent decades developed and advanced a type of national identity argument, which draws attention to the positive aspects of national identity, especially in the context of social justice. Following Miller, people in market-based and culturally diverse societies are most likely to support socially just institutions, including redistributive policies in welfare states, if a common identity informed by liberal values ties together those who are likely to contribute and those who are likely to benefit (Miller and Ali, 2016). This perspective on national identity can also be found in the works of scholars who explore links between liberal nationalism and multiculturalism (Kymlicka, 1995; Tamir, 1995, 2018).

Nevertheless, it is contributions by sociologists and historians that defined the second debate in nationalism studies. Key to these contributions are two elements. First, they debate the distinction between an ethnic and a civic model of the nation which is closely associated with Anthony Smith’s (1991) work. Smith elaborates on two different ideal types of the nation, namely the civic and the ethnic model of the nation. Here he draws on Hans Kohn’s (1967 [1944]) model of an eastern and a western type of nationalism. This distinction has been adopted and developed by several scholars within theories of nationalism (Brubaker, 1992; Greenfeld, 1992; Halikiopoulou et al., 2013; Hobsbawm, 1990; Plamenatz, 1973). Inspired by Kohn’s juxtaposition, Smith suggests a model that analytically separates two types of nations. On the one hand is the civic model of the nation that is characterised by ‘historic territory, legal-political community, legal-political equality of members, and common civic culture and ideology’ (Smith, 1991: 11). This civic model of the nation is compared to the ethnic model that is identified by ‘genealogy and presumed descent ties, popular mobilisation, vernacular languages, customs, and traditions’ (Smith, 1991: 12). The distinction is primarily analytical since its empirical application gives rise to a number of qualifications suggesting that most nations have elements of both models. So, Smith’s intention was mainly to introduce a broad type of categorisation into nationalism studies, in particular for the purpose of comparison.

The distinction between a civic model of the nation which is relatively state-centred, and an ethnic model of the nation that is primarily culture-centred, has to be addressed in its historical context and thus in relation to the formation of nation-states (Breuilly, 1996). In this context, it is important to consider the strength of the bonds between state and nation (Smith, 1992). The nation provides the state with a cultural basis of legitimation, implying that states and nations aspire to overlap to become at least national states, if not true nation-states; that is, a situation where there is a complete overlap between state and nation. Recognising the fact that states and nations rarely overlap has given rise to analyses of states that include many nations and/or ethnicities and that base their claims to legitimacy on a political rather than a cultural allegiance. Scholars taking part in the second debate in nationalism studies occasionally refer to this allegiance as based on patriotism rather than national identity, assuming that the former is primarily a political notion attached to the state and its institutions, in contrast to the latter, which is above all cultural (Brubaker, 2004b; Connor, 1994).

The discussion of political versus cultural allegiances is often pressing in cases of polyethnic states and pinpoints an area of research where nationalism studies overlap with ethnic studies. It should be noted that scholars whose works are discussed here in relation to studies of nationalism are in many cases also considered leading scholars in the field of ethnic studies. This includes, among others, Wimmer who is in the following heralded as a leading voice in the third nationalism debate. He is a scholar of equal importance to ethnic studies and he has written extensively on ethnic boundary making (Wimmer, 2008a, 2008b), including the relationship between ethnicity and war (Wimmer, 2002, 2013) and ethnicity and nation-building (Wimmer, 2018). In doing this, he shares common ground with Elliott Green (2010, 2013, 2020), another scholar whose work combines nationalism studies and ethnic studies, and who, like Wimmer, investigates these factors especially in both pre-, colonial and post-colonial Africa. Finally, Malesevic (2010), whose work on nationalism constitutes the crux of the third nationalism debate, has added significantly to the conceptual advancement of ethnic studies by advocating an approach to ethnicity that fundamentally challenges its explanatory force. In doing this, Malesevic draws upon Brubaker’s (2004a; Brubaker et al., 2004) work on ethnicity.

Another key element in the second debate in nationalism studies is the primordialist/constructivist debate. The constructivist side of the debate is most often associated with the scholarships of Anderson (drawing on Gellner) and Hobsbawm, where Hobsbawm stands out as the dominant figure. He sees nations as purely modern phenomena and also considers them a particular type of organisation that is attached to the capitalist mode of production (Hobsbawm, 1990). Hobsbawm is sceptical of the idea of nations having roots in pre-modern communities that extend into modern nations. Instead, Hobsbawm advocates seeing them as products of a project of construction – understood as a fabrication – carried out by ruling elites. This construction involves the invention of traditions (Hobsbawm and Ranger, 1983; Mosse, 1975).

In sharp contrast to Hobsbawm are Smith and Hutchinson who critique Anderson’s and Hobsbawm’s claim that nations are products of construction processes. According to them, nations have ethnic cores and although these may change in the course of history, these ethnic cores provide real cultural substance to the nation. And so, according to Hutchinson and Smith, nations are not purely modern phenomena. Instead, they build on ethnic communities that have roots in the pre-modern period. Thereby, Hutchinson and Smith advance the view that in order to understand nations fully they have to be examined in ‘la longue duree’; that is, the wider and deeper historical perspective (Armstrong, 1982; Hutchinson, 1994; Smith, 2008). Hutchinson and Smith concede that a certain amount of construction does take place in the development of modern nations. However, this is not construction understood as a fabrication but rather as creation (Smith, 1995).

Recent Developments in Nationalism Studies: The Third Debate

In recent years, a third debate has emerged among scholars such as Malesevic (2013, 2019), Wimmer (2002, 2013, 2018) and many more. It includes scholars who have ties to the second debate, most notably Brubaker, but who seek to explore and expand its conceptual and theoretical boundaries. The third debate furthermore involves a methodological element. This element deals with empirical evidence. Wimmer more than anyone has championed the use of quantitative methods in nationalism studies, in particular quantitative regression analysis to uncover shifts in pride in the nation and national identity especially in Africa (Wimmer, 2018; see also Green, 2010, 2013, 2020; Robinson, 2014). In doing this, Wimmer forms a contrast to most contemporary scholars including Malesevic, Brubaker, Breuilly and Umut Özkirimli who employ qualitative historical methods.

While being divided along lines of methodology, third-generation nationalism scholars share in the endeavour to capture and define nationalism. This takes place against the backdrop of a debate about two major claims that have been launched against nationalism both by former and contemporary theorists. First, they see nationalism as a thin ideology. Second, they believe nationalism to be in decline having had its peak with the breakdown of empires in the 19th century (Freeden, 1998; Heywood, 2003; Malesevic, 2019).

In relation to the first claim of nationalism being a thin ideology, contemporary sociological theorists Michael Freeden (1998: 750–751) and Andrew Heywood (2003: 136) are steadfast that nationalism has no coherent and articulated doctrine. According to these critics, in contrast to liberalism, socialism and conservatism, it lacks a comprehensive system of principles and ideas that span a wide range of political issues including issues pertaining to social justice and distribution of resources. This characterisation of nationalism resonates well with some of the classical theorists such as Anderson (1983: 5) and Gellner (1983: 124–125) who both believed nationalism to be conceptually chaotic, adding that it suffers from philosophical poverty. Malesevic rejects this claim. In doing so, he argues that nationalism is based on a rich history of ideas including those by thinkers such as Herder, Manzini, Ficthe, Hegel and Rousseau. However, he adds that it is much more than a standard political ideology. Besides offering a grand narrative of collective liberation and emancipation, nationalism constitutes a structural phenomenon that permeates the organisational configuration of the modern world (Malesevic, 2019: 13). In addition, according to Malesevic nationalism is embedded at the micro-interactional level, covering a set of social and cultural practices that is deeply ingrained and rooted in the everyday lives of people (Billig, 1995; Fox, 2017; Fox and Miller-Idriss, 2008). Against this background, Malesevic defines nationalism as a super-thick ideology that is grounded at the organisational, ideological and micro-interactional level.

Malesevic also rejects the claim that nationalism is a doctrine that had its peak in the 19th century with the decline of imperial rule. At this particular point in time when the salience of national borders and national states is very pronounced, it may not seem farfetched to reject the claim that nationalism is in decline. However, according to Malesevic, even at times when the nationalist doctrine may appear less dominant than what is currently the case, nationalism considered as a worldwide (and mass-based) sociological phenomenon only gained significance in the late 19th and 20th century. It is therefore not a thing of the past. Nationalism is, in fact, a modern phenomenon of the 20th and 21st centuries. It forms the core of modern subjectivity.

Taking a point of departure in the counterclaim that nationalism is grounded historically, organisationally, ideologically and micro-interactionally, three propositions about the nationalist doctrine emerge. Jointly, they constitute the analytical framework that one can identify across the work of third-generation nationalism scholars. The first proposition establishes the foundation of the analytical framework by clarifying levels of analysis.

The second proposition places the third generation of nationalism scholars in the context of nationalism studies. It makes it clear that this third generation is critical of, and breaks with, classical nationalism studies associated with Gellner, Anderson, Smith and Hutchinson. It does so because it seeks to stay clear of the debate on civic/ethnic nation-states which is closely associated with Smith and also the primordialist/constructivist debate. It also steers clear of the distinction between old and new nations introduced by Hugh Seton-Watson (1977).

While the analytical framework generated by the three propositions distances itself from the second debate in nationalism studies that took place during the 1980s and 1990s, it becomes clear with the third proposition that it is not entirely unaffected by this second debate. Proposition 3 engages with the constructivist faculties of agents. In doing so, it also believes that nations are thoroughly modern thus siding relatively more with the modernist camp than the ethnosymbolist camp.

While the above outlined analytical framework draws on the first and especially the second debate, it seeks to move beyond them. It seeks to contribute to an understanding of nationalism’s present and future. This takes place against the backdrop of the contribution that sociology, and especially political sociology, has made in understanding the development and emergence of nationalism, thus reflecting the work of those scholars who helped shape the first and second debate in nationalism studies. The third generation of nationalism scholars is therefore driven by a threefold ambition. Theoretically, they wish to strengthen and sharpen the analytical gaze of nationalism scholars by clarifying levels of analysis and common denominators to be analysed. Methodologically, they aspire to provide solid ground for comparative studies of nationalism that enable us to accumulate knowledge beyond that of individual case studies. Finally, empirically they seek to facilitate non-western approaches to and accounts of non-western contexts in recognition of the fact that nationalism studies have traditionally suffered from a pronounced Eurocentrism, although with important exemptions (Banton, 1983; Breuilly, 1993 [1982]; Green, 2010, 2013, 2020; Hechter, 2013; Kedourie, 1971; Warde et al., 2019; Wimmer, 2018).

These ambitions are triggered by debates in nationalism studies and political sociology more generally. However, they are also spurred on by a wish to understand the history, legacy and main features of the nation-state without falling victim to methodological nationalism; that is, the tendency to equate the concept of society and the nation-state in modernity. The notion of methodological nationalism is associated with the German sociologist Ulrich Beck (2000) who argued that social theory was unable to account for current changes in historical circumstances most notably globalisation because it was nationally bounded; that is, the body of social theory suffered from methodological nationalism. However, efforts to identify and engage with the problem of methodological nationalism in social theory can be traced back to the 1970s (Chernilo, 2006). It includes Smith (1979) who argues that methodological nationalism is embedded in institutional practices permeating every level of sociology. This has to be seen in relation to the British sociologist Hermonio Martins (1974), who claims that social theory is inclined to see the nation-state as the terminal unit. In so doing, he offers a logical version of methodological nationalism that may be contrasted to the historical version by Smith (Chernilo, 2006, 2007; Zürn, 2001). Smith and Martins both advocate transcending methodological nationalism from within social theory. In contrast, Beck supports a relatively more radical approach which involves rethinking social theory along the lines of a set of dichotomies, for example, modern nation-state society versus world risk society (Beck, 1998), simple globalisation versus reflexive cosmopolitanism (Beck, 2000) and so on. In the context of the third nationalism debate, the scholars who are heralded as its main representatives in the present context appear to favour the former approach; that is, to transcend methodological nationalism from within social theory.

The question that remains to be answered is this: what insights do the theoretical endeavours of the third generation of nationalism scholars generate when being applied empirically? We now begin to engage with this question when we apply the analytical framework to the Nordic countries, exploring the roles and interactions between institutions and agents in the making and unmaking of boundaries in the 19th-century nation-building projects in the Nordic countries.

The Roles of, and Interactions between, Institutions and Agency in 19th-Century Nordic Countries

Concluding Remarks

This article set out to explore how sociology can contribute to an understanding of nationalism’s present and future. In doing so, it used as its point of departure the works of the third generation of nationalism scholars, most notably their claim that nationalism is grounded historically, institutionally, organisationally and micro-interactionally (Malesevic, 2013, 2019; Wimmer, 2018). Elaborating on this claim, the article presented three propositions. Key to these three propositions is the roles of, and interactions between, institutions, organisations and agency. The article provided a brief insight into the analytical potential of the three propositions by applying them to nation-state formation in the 19th-century Nordic countries, focusing in particular on the roles of, and interactions between, cultural institutions and cultural agents.

The present analysis, though preliminary, indicates that the three Nordic composers: Grieg, Sibelius and Gade, were confronted with institutional frameworks that reflected the emergence of the nation as the central principle underlying the organisational configuration of the modern world. It appears that this shaped their oeuvres significantly. Most importantly, it inspired them to engage with contemporary society in a way that facilitated explicitly national receptions and interpretations of their works. The application of the three propositions reveals that other receptions and interpretations than the national were possible, most notably the Nordic. This reminds us that classical music is not a national, but, above all, a cross-cultural phenomenon. Nevertheless, classical music is made ‘national’ in several ways, partly when subjected to national interpretations, and partly when its style is perceived as national, causing it to be inscribed in a national musical tradition.

The analysis of the four Nordic entities led us to distinguish between two types of national projects, one revolving around the establishment of national cultural institutions (in Finland and Norway) and another centring on the transformation of these institutions (in Denmark and Sweden). Central to these two types of national projects is the asymmetrical relations that dominated this particular region. These relations have not received much attention in scholarly literature. However, the analytical framework and the three propositions tap into and draw attention to the impact of asymmetries among the Nordic countries and emphasise the role of the imperial past.

This bodes well for our understanding of the present and the future of nationalism. The analytical framework that is being advocated by third-generation nationalism scholars captures asymmetric relations both between and within the four Nordic nation-states and does so with a sensitivity to the historical grounding of nationalism. As a result, it offers a possible way into the development of areas in nationalism studies, such as post-colonial and gender relations, that have so far been neglected.

Finally, the analytical framework that constitutes the core of this article does so with a foundation in nationalism studies. It acknowledges the intellectual debt to these studies – the first and second debate within nationalism studies – while taking a critical position in relation to them. This acknowledges the fact that nation-states involve diversities that escape the civic–ethnic and primordial–constructed distinctions. These diversities constitute critical issues that sociology needs to address in its contribution to an understanding of nationalism’s present and future.