Nationalism vs. Internationalism: Fears, Uncertainties and Geopolitics in Europe

Abstract

Current events have created fears and uncertainties about peace in Europe and in the world as a whole. These concerns are a response to the rise of Vladimir Putin and the Russian-nationalist policies he has pursued vis-à-vis the former Soviet republics of Georgia, Ukraine, and elsewhere; Brexit—the British referendum calling for U.K. withdrawal from the European Union (EU); the emergence of an America-first, nationalist rhetoric in the Trump administration in the United States; and rising nationalist sentiments in other European countries. Do these events mark the beginning of the end of the multilateralist, liberal order that has avoided general war and sustained the European peace? More specifically, are we returning to the kind of realist geopolitics among states that prevailed prior to the two world wars and, for that matter, in previous centuries? Given the rise of this nationalism, how durable are the liberal institutions and norms of the post-World War II and post-Cold War orders?