Anderson and Gellner
Anderson and Gellner, despite the perceptible distinct features of their intellectual endeavors, share some basic academic interest and diagnose regarding nationalism in their books. Firstly, they both realize that modern form of nation state and nationalism are relatively recent phenomenon, which contingent on some unique conditions. Nations, or in Anderson’s term, imagined communities, as well as nationalism, are not universal phenomenon and cannot be held true cross history (Anderson), or cross culture (Gellner). They are social construction rather than natural entities. Anderson demonstrates four waves of nationalism since the late 18th century; while Gellner, form a very different angle, argues that only three out of eight typologies of nationalism engendering would success. Secondly, they both deem nationalism as institution rather than merely specific ideology. For Anderson, nationalism is more like a virtual kinship or a virtual religion. As for Gellner, nationalism is a precondition for the formation of nation state. It is not the existence of nations that informs nationalism, but actually the other way around. Thirdly, they both give credit to culture (though vaguely used and defined) in the process of the rise of modern nationalism. Anderson argues that nationalism was born through “cultural signification” (Anderson 1991:40) and should be understood as cultural rather than political processes. Gellner also holds that culture, in both agrarian and industrial societies, is a key domain that defines political form of states. More specifically speaking, Anderson and Gellner both acknowledge literate public as a defining condition for the birth of nationalism. For Anderson, this literate public was realized through the printing press for the mass, while for Gellner, it is through education that the society achieved “homogeneity” (Gellner 2006:23).
Anderson is a self-identified Marxist, while Gellner is not. This can be seen as the starting point to differentiate their explanations regarding the rise of nationalism. Although Gellner borrows plenty of Marx’s key notions in his work, for instance, the division of labor and so forth, he at the same time tries very hard to distance himself from Marxism. I would argue that Gellner does take a different path from classic Marxist analysis. Unlike Anderson, whose approach is historical materialist, Gellner’s approach, with no doubt, is functionalist. In other words, Anderson’s major interest lies in the historical and material conditions through which “imagined communities” were formed and transformed. He focuses on material culture, historical shift, economies, class struggles and colonial struggles. While Gellner’s major interest is the mechanism through which nationalism was formed and functioned. These two distinct approaches result in various different features.
First of all, their explanations of the rise of nationalism are different. Anderson sets out to explain the modern phenomenon of nation and nationalism in terms of cultural artifact and historical diffusion. According to him, the cultural roots of nationalism to two important conditions of the 18th century Europe, namely, the erosion of traditional religious community and the dynastic realm. Beneath this decline of sacred communities, language, and lineage, a fundamental change was taking place in modes of apprehending the world, thus making the transformation into new imagined community of nation possible. Nationalism is a new form of culture that spreads to massive scale through mass production of books and literate public. Once nationalism is created, it became modular and, in the next two centuries, was transplanted elsewhere, and merged with various social, political and ideological settings. Nationalism, according to Gellner, is a result of culture conflict. He argues that the three key factors, namely, power, shared culture (in an anthropological sense instead of normative sense) and education, will determine the varieties of nationalist experience. For Gellner, power within a society is always unequally distributed, engendering power-holders (or rulers) and non-power-holders. On the other hand, education may be distributed evenly or unevenly. With these binary assumptions, Gellner presents eight possible situations. Only in three of them nationalism arises.
Secondly, related to these two different explanations of the rise of nationalism, the relationship between nation and nationalism also varies according two these two authors. Generally speaking, Anderson sees nationalism as a result of the emergence of new form of imagined community of nation, even though he doesn’t make it explicit in his work. While Gellner makes it very explicitly in his book that nationalism, as a form of sentiment, preexists modern nation and serves as condition for the formation of modern nation state.
Thirdly, Anderson’s analysis consists of historical dimension, while Gellner’s work doesn’t. As I mentioned before, Gellner is a typical functionalist. He is interested in the mechanism of nationalism, and the function that nationalism serves. Even though he looks closely at different societies, namely agrarian and industrial, it seems that he still lack of historical perspective as Anderson does. His model is a product of deductive exercise rather than a historical materialist analysis, which obscures specific historical context. On the contrary, Anderson looks very close to specific historical moment and gives reliable account for some important historical events. In a word, Anderson provides a historical analysis, while that of Gellner is ahistorical.
Moreover, Anderson’s diffusion model allows him to make argument at global level. On the contrary, Gellner’s model mainly comes out from European experience, especially the UK experience. For example, Anderson contextualizes his argument in colonial and even post-colonial eras. He examines not only the case of Americas and Europe, but also Russia, Japan, Asia and Africa. Gellner, on the other hand, seems to construct his model in a very abstract way. It is hard to embed his model to the real world, and not able to apply his model to the rest of the world other than Europe.
Have argued the distinct features of Anderson and Gellner’s work, I am going to discuss some of the strength and weakness of their frameworks. Anderson’s work probably is one of the most cited academic books in social science. His framework not only gives plausible account for the origin of nationalism, but also is extremely useful to examine the spread of nationalism in today’s post-colonial condition. For me, the “imaginary” feature of nation can be seen as his major contribution, which allows future scholars to approach the issue of nation and nationalism from different directions, including culture, symbolic system, identity, agency and practice. It also enables a paradigm shift in terms of approaching the issue of territories. After Anderson, it is no longer plausible to frame territories as fixed geographical boundaries that overlap national government power. Instead, they are seen as collective imagined, a form of shared knowledge. Similarly, Gellner’s work is also widely cited. Despite the lacking of historical accountability and possible false of deductive argumentation, Gellner’s work did a very good job in terms of demonstrating the dynamic among culture, power and education. Moreover, it reveals the common assumption of modern nation state: equality, which facilitates our understanding of the difference between agrarian and industrial societies. However, for both Anderson and Gellner, gender was not an issue and was not considered as a variable in the process of nation formation and the rise of nationalism. However, as far as I am concern, every nation state is gendered and relies on certain form of gender differentiation.
To some extent, Balibar and Hobsbawm echo Anderson’s argument about the “imagined” feature of nation states. They all see nationalism as constructive and constitutive knowledge. This form of knowledge is facilitated by symbols and usually undergoes a process of naturalization. I assume that Hobsbawm’s emphasis on symbols could potentially enrich both Anderson and Gellner’s work, especially Gellner’s. Meanwhile, according to Balibar, language and race are considered as two paths through which ethnicity is produced. Both Anderson and Gellner see language as a crucial institution, but not race. If they enclose some of the discussion about race and ethnicity, their argument might potentially be more complete.
Anderson is a self-identified Marxist, while Gellner is not. This can be seen as the starting point to differentiate their explanations regarding the rise of nationalism. Although Gellner borrows plenty of Marx’s key notions in his work, for instance, the division of labor and so forth, he at the same time tries very hard to distance himself from Marxism. I would argue that Gellner does take a different path from classic Marxist analysis. Unlike Anderson, whose approach is historical materialist, Gellner’s approach, with no doubt, is functionalist. In other words, Anderson’s major interest lies in the historical and material conditions through which “imagined communities” were formed and transformed. He focuses on material culture, historical shift, economies, class struggles and colonial struggles. While Gellner’s major interest is the mechanism through which nationalism was formed and functioned. These two distinct approaches result in various different features.
First of all, their explanations of the rise of nationalism are different. Anderson sets out to explain the modern phenomenon of nation and nationalism in terms of cultural artifact and historical diffusion. According to him, the cultural roots of nationalism to two important conditions of the 18th century Europe, namely, the erosion of traditional religious community and the dynastic realm. Beneath this decline of sacred communities, language, and lineage, a fundamental change was taking place in modes of apprehending the world, thus making the transformation into new imagined community of nation possible. Nationalism is a new form of culture that spreads to massive scale through mass production of books and literate public. Once nationalism is created, it became modular and, in the next two centuries, was transplanted elsewhere, and merged with various social, political and ideological settings. Nationalism, according to Gellner, is a result of culture conflict. He argues that the three key factors, namely, power, shared culture (in an anthropological sense instead of normative sense) and education, will determine the varieties of nationalist experience. For Gellner, power within a society is always unequally distributed, engendering power-holders (or rulers) and non-power-holders. On the other hand, education may be distributed evenly or unevenly. With these binary assumptions, Gellner presents eight possible situations. Only in three of them nationalism arises.
Secondly, related to these two different explanations of the rise of nationalism, the relationship between nation and nationalism also varies according two these two authors. Generally speaking, Anderson sees nationalism as a result of the emergence of new form of imagined community of nation, even though he doesn’t make it explicit in his work. While Gellner makes it very explicitly in his book that nationalism, as a form of sentiment, preexists modern nation and serves as condition for the formation of modern nation state.
Thirdly, Anderson’s analysis consists of historical dimension, while Gellner’s work doesn’t. As I mentioned before, Gellner is a typical functionalist. He is interested in the mechanism of nationalism, and the function that nationalism serves. Even though he looks closely at different societies, namely agrarian and industrial, it seems that he still lack of historical perspective as Anderson does. His model is a product of deductive exercise rather than a historical materialist analysis, which obscures specific historical context. On the contrary, Anderson looks very close to specific historical moment and gives reliable account for some important historical events. In a word, Anderson provides a historical analysis, while that of Gellner is ahistorical.
Moreover, Anderson’s diffusion model allows him to make argument at global level. On the contrary, Gellner’s model mainly comes out from European experience, especially the UK experience. For example, Anderson contextualizes his argument in colonial and even post-colonial eras. He examines not only the case of Americas and Europe, but also Russia, Japan, Asia and Africa. Gellner, on the other hand, seems to construct his model in a very abstract way. It is hard to embed his model to the real world, and not able to apply his model to the rest of the world other than Europe.
Have argued the distinct features of Anderson and Gellner’s work, I am going to discuss some of the strength and weakness of their frameworks. Anderson’s work probably is one of the most cited academic books in social science. His framework not only gives plausible account for the origin of nationalism, but also is extremely useful to examine the spread of nationalism in today’s post-colonial condition. For me, the “imaginary” feature of nation can be seen as his major contribution, which allows future scholars to approach the issue of nation and nationalism from different directions, including culture, symbolic system, identity, agency and practice. It also enables a paradigm shift in terms of approaching the issue of territories. After Anderson, it is no longer plausible to frame territories as fixed geographical boundaries that overlap national government power. Instead, they are seen as collective imagined, a form of shared knowledge. Similarly, Gellner’s work is also widely cited. Despite the lacking of historical accountability and possible false of deductive argumentation, Gellner’s work did a very good job in terms of demonstrating the dynamic among culture, power and education. Moreover, it reveals the common assumption of modern nation state: equality, which facilitates our understanding of the difference between agrarian and industrial societies. However, for both Anderson and Gellner, gender was not an issue and was not considered as a variable in the process of nation formation and the rise of nationalism. However, as far as I am concern, every nation state is gendered and relies on certain form of gender differentiation.
To some extent, Balibar and Hobsbawm echo Anderson’s argument about the “imagined” feature of nation states. They all see nationalism as constructive and constitutive knowledge. This form of knowledge is facilitated by symbols and usually undergoes a process of naturalization. I assume that Hobsbawm’s emphasis on symbols could potentially enrich both Anderson and Gellner’s work, especially Gellner’s. Meanwhile, according to Balibar, language and race are considered as two paths through which ethnicity is produced. Both Anderson and Gellner see language as a crucial institution, but not race. If they enclose some of the discussion about race and ethnicity, their argument might potentially be more complete.
