Nation-building in post-colonial states: Historical past and present-day realities

Abstract

In the form the nation-state has been known until now it formed in Europe and North America in the Early Modern time and flourished in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, being adequate to realities of the world of industrial capitalism and cultural nationalism. However, nowadays other trends, related to superintensive globalization and post-industrialism, are dominating in the world. At present, the Western states have to depart from the classical concept of the nation and seek solutions to a completely different problem – of supporting their citizens' unity at preservation of cultural diversity brought by migrants from all over the world in recent decades. Under the current circumstances, it should not be ruled out that post-colonial states, most of which are multicultural initially due to their unique history of formation, will find themselves in an advantageous position, if they abandon attempts to build nations according to the outdated classical Western pattern. While irreversible, globalization is associated with Modernity (Modern time) started in the West half a millennium ago, nation-building in contemporary post-colonial countries shows that globalization is by no means equal to Westernization, and that Modernity as a historically-specific type of society and culture, splits into multiple modernities.