Is national identity in crisis? An assessment of national imaginations in the early 2020s

Abstract

The current context of a worldwide pandemic has once again sparked debate about the bleak future of nationalism. For those who support this view, the fact that long-lasting national identities are being decisively contested represents a major symptom of the crisis of nationalism, which the challenges associated with the coronavirus outbreak can only accentuate. In this paper, it is my objective to prove this belief incorrect and to demonstrate that nationalism remains almost hegemonic as a form of political and communal identification. My method for achieving this goal comprises two interlinked endeavours: first, a theoretical analysis of the concepts of crisis and national identity; second, an overview of current global conflicts and political debates to determine the extent to which they fit with a nationalist worldview. The results of this research suggest that national perspectives – from which national identities arise – are not experiencing any meaningful challenge in contemporary societies. Even in those cases where deep-seated national discourses are threatened, such opposition remains constrained by the assumptions of the nationalist worldview. Consequently, and albeit the COVID-19 pandemic may ultimately result in the triumph of globalism, it is more likely that international cooperation will develop in a world constructed of national imaginations rather than one from which these have disappeared.