Contradiction between the nation-state and democracy - the major characteristic of the modern political system Lecture 9
Contents Introduction Sovereignty and the nation-state Contradictions between democracy and the state Summary
Introduction - Political systems, what they are about? What is political system? Politics involves literally everything. However, social, economic and political relations are brought into legal and normative systems. The ‘system’ is largely comprised of political and social institutions, where the role of major institution has long ago been taken by the ‘state’. In virtually all communities political rule is exercised through the institutions of government or the state.
Political systems have the general ideal of establishing order, the ideal political systems have the purpose of establishing sustainable, equitable and virtuous order, which is often is squeezed into the idea of ‘democracy’. Nation and society should be regarded as a single unit without class, cultural and ethnic discrimination. So, how states affect democratic political system? How ‘state’ achieves the ‘democracy’?
Sovereignty and the nation-state Until recently, states were basically considered as single autonomous institutions in international relations and international law. They were sovereign entities acting on behalf of their populations. They are still sovereign entities which are entitled to bring social justice, equality, rule of law, wealth and security to their citizen. The sovereignty of the state gives it the ultimate authority in internal and external relations.
Sovereignty The concept of sovereignty was born in the seventeenth century, as a result of the emergence in Europe of the modern state. In the medieval period, princes, kings and emperors had acknowledged a higher authority than themselves in the form of God – the ‘King of Kings’ –and the Papacy.
However, as feudalism faded in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the authority of transnational institutions, such as the Catholic Church and the Holy Roman Empire, was replaced by that of centralising monarchies. In England this was achieved under the Tudor dynasty, in France under the Bourbons, in Spain under the Habsburgs and so on. For the first time, secular rulers were able to claim to exercise supreme power, and this they did in a new language of sovereignty.
Sovereignty means absolute and unlimited power. Sovereignty endows a ruler with authority and coercive power. So he can tell people what to do And when it is not enough it makes people do what is needed by force.
Internal sovereignty refers to the location of a final authority within the state. Although much of political theory involves a debate about where such sovereignty should be located, the idea may be in applicable to fragmented and pluralistic modern societies.
External sovereignty refers to a state’s autonomy in international affairs. Fused with the idea of democratic government, this has developed into the principle of national sovereignty, embodying the ideals of independence and self-government. Critics nevertheless argue that in view of the internationalisation of many areas of modern life, the idea may now be redundant or, since it gives a state exclusive jurisdiction over its people, dangerous.
The nation-state Nationalism is, at heart, the doctrine that each nation is entitled to self-determination, reflected in the belief that, as far as possible, the boundaries of the nation and those of the state should coincide. Thus the idea of a ‘nation’ has been used as a way of establishing a non-arbitrary basis for the boundaries of the state. This implies that the highest form of political organisation is the nation-state; in effect, the nation, each nation, is a sovereign entity.
The nation is a cultural entity, reflecting a sense of linguistic, religious, ethnic or historical unity: the nationstate therefore offers the prospect of both cultural cohesion and political unity. However, although its significance may be overstated, globalisation in its various forms has created a web of interconnectedness that alters both the character of the nation-state and the nature of global politics.
National sovereignty is the cornerstone of international law, giving each nation the right of self-defence and to determine its own destiny. Nevertheless, the post-1945 period has been characterised by a marked trend towards globalisation, reflected in the growth of economic independence as national economies have been incorporated into a global one, and in the emergence of supranational bodies such as the United Nations, the World Trade Organisation and the European Union.
In practice, however, the nation-state is an ideal type and has probably never existed in perfect form anywhere in the world. No state is culturally homogeneous; all contain some kind of cultural or ethnic mix. Therefore, at any given stage of its development the state has never achieved a true representation of all the cultural and ethnic diversities. The ‘democracy’, in sense of the ‘government for the citizen’ has never been realised.
Contradiction between state and democracy The history of development of the state gives a generalised idea about what purpose states have. States contain citizens and promote their rights, however not so equitably as it would have been desired. Not all states are actually states for ‘citizen’. In fact most of states in the history were not the citizens’ states.
So, theocratic state was largely the state of believers. The feudal state was the state of feudal rights of property The early bourgeois state was the state of aristocracy united with the emerging bourgeois. The nation-state is the state of a particular nation. The democratic state can be claimed as the state of citizens - but has it ever been achieved, the ideal of the state existing for its citizens without any discrimination?
Still, the idea of equitable and non-discriminating state cannot come to terms with the ‘nationalism’, which still is the basic ideology constituting the essence of the state. The basic contradiction lies in the parallel development of the ‘nation-state’ and of ‘democracy’.
As well as it is with ‘democracy’, the ‘nation-state’ is also more of a philosophical phenomenon, where the notion itself cannot be defined strictly and is hard to empirically analyse. It is an absolute ideal, where the definition of it is no more than the current reflection of the values comprising the ideal. It is a present state where the end is an absolute category. Pursuit of an absolute ideal of the nation-state has its’ dangers, it has already led to one of the most destructive wars in human history.
Pursuit of an absolute ‘democracy’ is more ambiguous. Democracy is being built along with the building of the ‘nation -state’. Definitions and conceptual justification of each is least to say questionable. Is it just to build a democracy for the main nation of the state? How ‘nation-state’ can overcome the inherent contradiction of discriminatory nature of the nation-state with the ‘democracy’ - equitable representation without discrimination?
But can we actually speak about failure of the democracy in nation-states? Or the other way around, was it a failure of establishing nation-states in democracies? At the very basics, this is rather a question of ‘power’ distribution. Power distribution in most liberal democracies, and basically all over the world is dominated not by democratic assumptions but are characterised by class relations, where no ethnic and cultural considerations have ever taken precedence over economic and geopolitical interests of powerful groups with agency (classes, private and political organisations).
So what does the development of the ‘state’ offers in this regard? ‘Nation-state’ precedes the ‘democracy’ (political order). But the democratic ideas herald the creation of ‘nation-state’. However far and unsatisfying they may look to witnesses of post-modern democracy, these ideas were powerful enough to ignite greatest revolutions in the history of mankind, and certain of them have led to establishment of modern ‘nationstates’.
In accordance with the development of the state, where primary logic of increasing inclusiveness and representation of the population dictates the further development of the state, the achievement of ‘democracy’ in modern ‘nationstate’ requires the separation of nationalist assumptions from the ‘state’. As soon as the ‘state’ is no longer a state for the sovereignty of a particular nation, the state can be put into service of its ‘citizens’ gaining sovereignty for the whole population.
The liberal theory and practice have an extensive experience in establishing the state separated from nationalist assumptions in understanding ‘state’. If the nation-state is claimed to have failed to achieve democracy, it is then beyond the capabilities of the state and its government to establish a non-discriminatory rule.
Multiculturalism as one of the pillars of the nondiscriminatory society have also been witnessed to fail even in those democracies where the highest advancement of civil and political rights were thought to be achieved. Cultures and ethnic diversities are highly reluctant to mix and integrate painlessly into one society. Ghetto’s and ethnic communities of many countries of the world sustaining their ethnic and cultural identities have long been at the centre of most of political discussions. And have also been cause of many ethnic conflicts, least to say.
As multiculturalism has also failed to bring diverse societies into a single unit of ‘citizens’ and hence it is beyond the powers of the state to overcome this obstacle the further development of the ‘democratic’ society needs to be withdrawn from the competencies of national rule. The next step to be taken is to establish a global rule for democracy’
Thus, the supranational sovereignty takes place as the central argument for the achievement of democracy. A supranational body is one which exercises jurisdiction not over any single state but within an international area comprising several states. A supranational body is considered to have cosmopolitain attitude towards nationstates, hence it is free of ethnic and cultural assumptions regarding justice, equality and one’s freedom and rights.
Domain of international relations is claimed to be a conflictual state of nature as well. And denial of autonomy to states would bring the peace among them as well. Existing states would become peripheral institutions and commencing of any conflict would become impossible for any nation hence it is no more an independent sovereign.
Summary It is not by any means a finished process, the establishment of supranational world government which will ensure universal democracy. Quite contrary to that, the supranational project faces ‘old-new’ challenges as well. There are not only the national and ethnic differences. Otherwise wouldn’t it be possible to claim that UN actually can become a substitute for the global government, yet it isn’t, exactly due to such interests separate from just cultural and ethnic diversities.
The political-economic reasons have always driven the creation of states. Hence, it is about political-economic interests of different classes and groups. Thus, questions follow: 1. What are these political and economic reasons which still divide democracy and the state? 2. What are the characteristics of the democratic political system? 3. What are the perspectives of the global democratic government? (this goes to your IWS - CPCП - Please write an 200 essay - plagiarism will not be appreciated)
Reading: Oxford Handbook - Political Theory - Chapter 21, ‘Democracy and the State’, by M. E. Warren. Please read the Introduction, the whole 3 d paragraph. The next 4 th paragraph can be used to prepare to the IWS question on perspectives of democracy. Minogue - Chapter 13 - p. 103
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