Re-Interpreting Cultural Nationalism

This article reviews standard and recent interpretations of cultural nationalism. It rejects "invention of tradition" perspectives, and assumptions that it is a surrogate statist movement, concerned with cultural homogeneity, that it is archaising in character, and that it is a transient movement, incompatible with full modernisation. It argues cultural nationalism seeks to "rediscover" an historically-rooted way of life; its concern is communitarian; that cultural nationalists act primarily as moral and social innovators; and that it is a recurring movement, embedded in the modern world.