How can be nationalism a cause of conflict?

Answer 1

Nationalism forms around a sense of identity, either of a tribal nature, an ethnic grouping and/or a shared value system. There will be other causal factors too, and sometimes a combination. The collapse of Empires was in large part due to a sense of rising nationalism, for example Austria-Hungary tried to encompass groups such as the Magyars (Hungarian), Serbs, Germanic peoples etc and these groups had very different sense of identity that (with the help of agitators like the Russians - who encouraged a Serbian sense of identity outside of the Empire) created breakaway factions that eventually led to the opening of World War 1 when Austria-Hungary tried to rein in the Serbs. The Russians had successfully undermined Austria-Hungary by exploiting a sense of nationality amongst Serbs. In Germany in World War 2, a sense of national identity led to the marginalisation and destruction of groups that were not considered ethnically "German". The loss of the American colonies by Britain was fomented by British legislation/taxation being foisted upon a group that had no voice in the British Parliament. This created a sense of "them and us" - separateness - that was the germination of a sense of being a separate nation. Although Americans wanted to remain British (e.g. the Olive Branch Petition) King George III's intransigence force the issue - rubber-stamped the "them and us" position - and led to a successful revolt against Britain, which was unable to sustain the expense of a foreign war (this being in part the reason for the taxes in the first place - "to defend the colonies").

Ethnic groups in North America, New Zealand and Australia are considered "first nation" peoples because of this ethic distinction between their race and that of the invaders/colonists. Religious groups also create a sense of separateness that surfaces as nationalism, most notably the Zionist component of Judism, which espouses a fundamentalist belief concerning the "land of Israel" in the Middle East (fundamentalist in the sense that "the laws of god trump the laws of man"), one of the few examples of state-sponsored fundamentalist doctrine. The sense of nationality around faith is exploited to bolster a sense of unity based on notions of a shared identity and indeed shared persecution as a "separate nation" in WW2 Germany. The aim here is to establish a nation with one faith in an era when nations are moving towards multiculturalism and tolerance.

When groups with very different sense of identity have to co-exist there is almost always conflict. In Britain, local laws preventing certain practices of other faiths (butchery of animals in the street, for example) create tensions within faith groups that consider such practices to be part of their religious identity - although this is not nationalism as such, it is a precursor to the "them and us" mindset that, if left unchecked, can create "nations within nations". Multiculturalism can present a challenge to the notion of nationhood that states have to take seriously, and sensitively too.