The Nation-State

 
    What exactly is a nation-state? To attempt a definition, let’s look at both parts of the word.  A nation is a group of people who share a similar set of beliefs regarding political concepts, ideals, and institutions.  These people may also share a common language or culture, but more importantly, they adhere to a general set of political values.  A state, on the other hand, is an entity that possesses certain characteristics including land territory, a population, a government, an organized economy, and a system of circulation (Glasner 1993).  States also have some form of sovereignty as well as recognition by a portion of the international community.  A nation-state, therefore, is a combination of these two terms -- quite simply, a nation with a state wrapped around it (Glasner 1993).

    Nation-states are the basic members of international political organizations such as the United Nations and are the major actors in international military actions like the Gulf War. Many nation-states, or would-be nation-states, command great loyalty from large numbers of their inhabitants; thus, the nation-state is probably still the most important form (or one of the most important forms) of community around the world.  It is what most of us know best. In fact, many of us probably think spontaneously of our own community and of world affairs in terms of nations and nationalism. Part of this unit examines the problems with localized nationalism, but the larger purpose is to examine some global forms of community that are alternatives and rivals to the nation-state. These alternatives may be better or they may be worse. In any case, they may be the future.  The reading on the nation-state is:
 

Kennedy, Paul: “The Future of the Nation-State”
Paul Kennedy is an English-born historian, now teaching at Yale University. This selection describes the nation "from above," from the perspective of its centralized government and its role as an actor in international affairs. Kennedy points out the current challenges to the nation from both “transnational" and "sub-national” developments. His analysis prompts us to ask at least two basic questions: First, is his assessment of the seriousness of the challenges to the nation correct? And second, should we conclude that the nation is outdated and needs to be replaced by other forms of organization?

• Is the nation-state really a community?
• Do you identify more closely with a nation-state community or with other communities that transcend state boundaries, such as religion, culture, politics, or environmentalism?

    Global economic communities have grown rapidly in recent years.  This growth is in part a result of changes in technology, communication, and human mobility.  Global economic communities include investors, bankers, and financiers, and increasingly managers, scientists, engineers, educators, and other skilled professionals. These communities may not always speak a common language -- although English gains ground every day -- but they often possess a common style and an “economic culture” that cuts across other and national boundaries.  An increasingly important component of these global economic communities is multinational corporations (MNCs), corporations with sites of production in various countries around the world.

    There are several perspectives on the limits and possibilities of the global economic community.  The predominant view suggests that countries are increasingly linked through global markets to networks of trade, investment, and technology transfer and that such networks are beneficial because they contribute to the overall efficiency and growth of the world economy and therefore to the material welfare of the world’s people. This view is sometimes referred to as the “liberal” or “integrative” view of the world.

    A second view suggests that economic globalization is not necessarily good and that it could undermine values of democracy if it is not accompanied by democratic political linkages among communities and citizens of different countries. Whereas the first perspective emphasizes values of efficiency and economic growth, the second view emphasizes values of political participation and self-determination as the basis of global community.

    A third view is the “economic nationalist” perspective. From this perspective, the world appears neither as a transnational collection of investors and traders seeking wealth through efficiency nor as a society of global citizens seeking to expand democracy, but instead as nation-states competing for power and wealth. This view suggests that economic and industrial development are important to a state’s power and status in the world and that states can use their power to manipulate the economy and promote rapid industrial development.

    The issue of multinational corporations (MNCs) is an important point upon which these three perspectives disagree.

• Do MNCs promote efficiency, growth, and development or do they sustain global inequalities of power and wealth, keeping the majority of the world’s population poor and subordinate to the wealthier minority?
• Can nation-states design policies that will allow them to benefit from operations of global firms?
• Can MNCs serve as vehicles for economic integration and cultural learning?

Greider, William: The Global Marketplace: A Closet Dictator
William Greider is a journalist and author whose recent books include Secrets of the Temple, about the Federal Reserve, and Who Will Tell the People?, which deals with the corruption of American democracy. The previous reading described a world that is increasingly integrated by trade, investment, and technology -- in short, a kind of global community based on norms of private profit, economic efficiency, and growth. In this article, journalist William Greider presents an alternative view of the global community. If economic globalization occurs without a corresponding globalization of political democracy, Greider sees a threat to democratic self-determination. In a world where the bargaining power of MNCs and the competitive pressures of the market determine what, where, how, and by whom products are produced and consumed, the ability of citizens to democratically determine their own conditions of work and life will be undermined, thus weakening democracy through unrestrained economic globalization. Greider suggest that we ought to think about the possibilities of a global community based on values of democratic self-determination. How would our thoughts and actions have to change for Greider's vision of global community to be possible?
 

The Economist, “Everybody's Favorite Monsters: A Survey of Multinationals”
The Economist is an informative, conservative weekly magazine on economic and political affairs. MNCs are often thought to be the chief agents of economic globalization. This article argues that they may not be the monsters they are sometimes perceived to be. The Economist article also claims that there are additional disparities between perception and reality. Some MNCs are new; many are small. MNCs are more regional than global in orientation.  Their ownership is far more spread across nation-states than believed, and alliances among them make it increasingly inaccurate to speak of "U.S. MNCs" or "industrialized-world MNCs."  Some are even publicly owned.

•  Would life be somehow "better" (and for whom?) with some other channel for global integration, e.g., with less MNC activity but more trade or more migration?
• What about privatization of state-owned firms?
• Can MNCs and other buyers improve on the economic performance of such firms?
• If a main reason for the existence of MNCs is the high pre-production cost of research and development that leads to technological progress, then is a region that constrains MNC’s going to sacrifice economic gain?
• What other institutions could better bear the costs and risks of research and development?

Mies, Maria: "Housewifization International: Women and the New International Division of Labor"
 Maria Mies is a sociologist and author of several books, including Indian Women and Patriarchy (1980) and The Lace Makers of Narsapur (1982). She is currently active in the women's and environmental movements in Germany. Her most recent book is Women, the Last Colony (1988), written in collaboration with Claudia von Werlhof and Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen. In this article, Mies argues that "housewifization" -- the notion that women worldwide are supported primarily by a husband (male breadwinner) while their job is to reproduce the family unit -- is a strategy by capitalists to blur the role of women in order to maximize profits. She asserts that poor women in Third World countries perform "informal" and thus invisible labor to make cheap items for First World women. This link allows capitalists (i.e., MNCs) to reduce labor costs and gain huge profits.  Mies suggests there is a capitalist conspiracy of "blaming the victim" that sees Third World women as responsible for their own poverty when they over-reproduce instead of produce for the world marketplace. In this view, women are breeders of "human resources" who if "underutilized" (i.e., if they are but surplus, unemployed labor) are inefficient consumers (extra mouths to feed but not contributing to international capitalism).
 
As you read this article, consider the following questions:

• Do you agree with the author?
• Are women more important as producers in the world economy or as reproducers of cheap labor?
• To what is Mies referring when she writes, "the enslavement and exploitation of one set of women is the foundation of a qualitatively different type of enslavement of another set of women?"