Ernest Gellner’s Perspectives on Nationalism in Nations and Nationalism

Abstract

Nationalism has been one of the fuzziest and elephantine concepts which does not belong strictly to any specific social discipline. In theorizing about the issues of nation and nationalism, Ernest Gellner stood apart from the rest of his generation of post-war social scientists. During the period when the subject of nationalism was most disparaged, Gellner produced many remarkable writings on nationalism. This paper will explore the theoretical underpinnings of nationalism developed by Ernest Gellner in his famous book Nations and Nationalism. He is known to have provided a most logical and thorough explanation of the existence of nationalism as a corollary of modernity. Many issues emerge from his perspectives on nationalism. This paper attempts to explore a few of them. Firstly, it seeks explanations for Gellner’s single-minded obsession with the issues of nations and nationalism. Secondly, his ideas about modernity and nationalism are revisited. And finally, the dissection of the strengths and weakness of his project of nations and nationalism is done to understand the underpinnings of his overall perspective. The paper concludes that despite a few inconsistencies in Gellner’s theory about nationalism, it remains one of the most potent and plausible accounts in the modern perspectives on nationalism. His argument about the association between nationalism and modernity has a universal appeal and empirical promise.