Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-8r8nv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-08T17:03:13.777Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Liberal nationalism, nationalist liberalization, and democracy: the cases of post-Soviet Estonia and Ukraine

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Lena Surzhko-Harned
Lena Surzhko-Harned*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, USA
*
* Email: lms34@pitt.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The bulk of scholarly literature views nationalism as harmful to democratic transition. Yet Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan indirectly suggest that nationalism may benefit democratization. This study shows that under the right conditions nationalism can benefit democratic transition. Building on the typology of Linz and Stepan and the liberal nationalism tradition of Yael Tamir and David Miller, this study examines the transitions in Estonia and Ukraine. It introduces an important layer, the multinational federal state, into the typologies developed by Linz and Stepan to show that nationalism can prove a useful political tool of mobilization in a multiethnic setting.

Keywords

democratizationnationalismliberalizationEstoniaUkraine

Information

Type
Articles
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 38 , Issue 5 , September 2010 , pp. 623 - 646
Copyright
Copyright © 2010 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Abizadeh, Arash. “Historical Truth, National Myth and Liberal Democracy: On the Coherence of Liberal Nationalism.” Journal of Political Philosophy 12.3 (2004): 291–313. Print.Google Scholar
Barrington, Lowell W. “'Nation’ and ‘Nationalism': The Misuse of the Key Concepts in Political Science.” PS: Political Science and Politics 30.4 (1997): 712–16. Print.Google Scholar
Barrington, Lowell W., Hesson, Erik S., and Silver, Brian D. “Research Note. The Motherland is Calling. Views of Homeland among Russians in the Near Abroad.” World Politics 55 (Jan. 2003): 290–313. Print.Google Scholar
Berglund, Sten, et al. Challenges to Democracy. Cheltenham: Elgar, 2001. Print.Google Scholar
Braumoeller, Bear F. “Deadly Doves: Liberal Nationalism and the Democratic Peace in the Soviet Successor States.” International Studies Quarterly 41.3 (1997): 375–402. Print.Google Scholar
Bremmer, Ian. “The Politics of Ethnicity: Russians in the New Ukraine.” Europe-Asia Studies 46.2 (1994): 261–83. Print.Google Scholar
Bremmer, Ian, and Taras, Ray. Nation and Politics in the Soviet Successor States. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. Print.Google Scholar
Bunce, Valerie. “Rethinking Recent Democratization: Lessons from the Postcommunist Experience.” World Politics 55 (Jan. 2003): 167–92. Print.Google Scholar
Carothers, Thomas, and Barndt, William. “Civil Society.” Foreign Policy 117 (1999-2000): 18–24, 26-29. Print.Google Scholar
Dawson, Jane I. Eco-nationalism: Anti-nuclear Activism and National Identity in Russia, Lithuania, and Ukraine. Durham, NC: Duke UP, 1996. Print.Google Scholar
Delanty, Gerard, and Kumar, Krishan. The Sage Handbook of Nations and Nationalism. London and Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2006. Print.Google Scholar
Fournier, Anna. “Mapping Identities: Russian Resistance to Linguistic Ukrainisation in Central and Eastern Ukraine.” Europe-Asia Studies 54.3 (2002): 415–33. Print.Google Scholar
Gellner, Ernest. Nationalism. New York: New York UP, 1997. Print.Google Scholar
Gellner, Ernest. Nations and Nationalism: New Perspectives on the Past. Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP, 1983. Print.Google Scholar
Gellner, Ernest, and Breuilly, John. Nations and Nationalism. 2nd ed. Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP, 2008. Print.Google Scholar
George, Alexander L., and Bennett, Andrew. Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences. BCSIA Studies in International Security. Cambridge, MA: MIT P, 2005. Print.Google Scholar
Hallik, Klara. Estonia: Kontury Etnopoliticheskoi Evoliutsii, 1988-1993 Gg.: Ocherki, Dokumenty, Materialy. Seriia “Natsionalnye Dvizheniia V Sssr I V Postsovetskom Prostranstve.” Ed. G.A. Komarova and Tsentr po izucheniiu mezhnatsionalnykh otnoshenii (Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk). 2 vols. Moscow: Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk Tsentr po izucheniiu mezhnatsionalnykh otnoshenii Instituta etnologii i antropologii im. N.N. Miklukho-Maklaia, 1994. Print.Google Scholar
Howard, Marc Morjăe. The Weakness of Civil Society in Post-Communist Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2003. Print.Google Scholar
Howard, Marc Morjăe. “The Weakness of Postcommunist Civil Society.” Journal of Democracy 3.1 (2002): 157–69. Print.Google Scholar
Ishiyama, John T. “Representational Mechanisms and Ethnopolitics: Evidence from Transitional Democracies in Eastern Europe.” East European Quarterly 33 (1999): 251–79. Print.Google Scholar
Komarova, G.A., ed. Estonia: Kontury Etnopoliticheskoi Evolutcii, 1988-1993 Gg.: Ocherki, Dokumenty, Materialy. 2 vols. Moscow: Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk Tsentr po izucheniiu mezhnatsionalnykh otnoshenii Instituta etnologii i antropologii im. N.N. Miklukho-Maklaia, 1994. Print.Google Scholar
Kravchuk, L.M. Maemo Te, Shcho Maemo; Spohady I Rozdumy. Kyiv: “Stolittia,” 2002. Print.Google Scholar
Kudryavtsev, I.E. Estonia: Kontury Etnopoliticheskoi Evolutsii, 1988-1993 Gg.: Ocherki, Dokumenty, Materialy. Seriia “Natsionalnye Dvizheniia V Sssr I V Postsovetskom Prostranstve.” Ed. G.A. Komarova and Tsentr po izucheniiu mezhnatsionalnykh otnoshenii (Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk). 2 vols. Moscow: Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk Tsentr po izucheniiu mezhnatsionalnykh otnoshenii Instituta etnologii i antropologii im. N.N. Miklukho-Maklaia, 1994. Print.Google Scholar
Kuzio, Taras. “The National Factor in Ukraine's Quadruple Transition.” Contemporary Politics 6.2 (2000): 143–64. Print.Google Scholar
Kuzio, Taras, and Wilson, Andrew. Ukraine: Perestroika to Independence. New York: St. Martin's, 1994. Print.Google Scholar
Laar, Mart. “The Restoration of Independence in Estonia.” Estonia: Identity and Independence: On the Boundary of Two Worlds. Ed. Subrenat, Jean-Jacques. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2004. 225–38. Print.Google Scholar
Leff, Carol Skalnik. “Democratization and Disintegration in Multinational States: The Breakup of the Communist Federations.” World Politics 51.2 (1999): 205–35. Print.Google Scholar
Lieven, Anatol. The Baltic Revolution: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and the Path to Independence. New Haven: Yale UP, 1993. Print.Google Scholar
Lieven, Anatol. Ukraine & Russia: A Fraternal Rivalry. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace P, 1999. Print.Google Scholar
Linz, Juan J., and Stepan, Alfred C. Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation: Southern Europe, South America, and Post-Communist Europe. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1996. Print.Google Scholar
McKim, Robert, and McMahan, Jeff, eds. The Morality of Nationalism. New York: Oxford UP, 1997. Print.Google Scholar
Miller, David. On Nationality. New York: Clarendon, 1995. Print.Google Scholar
Resler, Tamara. “Dilemmas of Democratisation: Safeguarding Minorities in Russia, Ukraine and Lithuania.” Europe-Asia Studies 49.1 (1997): 89–106. Print.Google Scholar
Rutland, Peter. “Democracy and Nationalism in Armenia.” Europe-Asia Studies 46.5 (1994): 839–61. Print.Google Scholar
Rüütel, Arnold. Estonia: Vozrozhdenie Budushchego. Tallinn: Ilo, 2003. Print.Google Scholar
Snyder, Jack L. From Voting to Violence: Democratization and Nationalist Conflict. New York: Norton, 2000. Print.Google Scholar
Subrenat, Jean-Jacques, ed. Estonia: Identity and Independence: On the Boundary of Two Worlds. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2004. Print.Google Scholar
Taagepera, Rein. Estonia: Return to Independence. Boulder: Westview, 1993. Print.Google Scholar
Tamir, Yael. Liberal Nationalism. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1993. Print.Google Scholar
Tishkov, V.A. Estonia: Kontury Etnopoliticheskoi Evoliutsii, 1988-1993 Gg.: Ocherki, Dokumenty, Materialy. Seriia “Natsionalnye Dvizheniia V Sssr I V Postsovetskom Prostranstve.” Ed. G.A. Komarova and Tsentr po izucheniiu mezhnatìsionalnykh otnoshenii (Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk). 2 vols. Moscow: Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk Tsentr po izucheniu mezhnatsionalnykh otnoshenii Instituta etnologii i antropologii im. N.N. Miklukho-Maklaia, 1994. Print.Google Scholar
Wilson, Andrew. Ukrainian Nationalism in the 1990s: A Minority Faith. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1996. Print.Google Scholar