Sleeping Dogs, Prowling Cats and Soaring Doves: Three Paradoxes in the Political Theory of Nationhood

Abstract

This article examines three paradoxes concerning nationhood and nationalism in which political theorists have become entangled. Until recently most mainstream political theorists ignored nationhood. In constructing their own theories, however, they tacitly relied upon it to supply the polity with boundaries, solidarity and collective power. More recent attempts to defend national self-determination on liberal grounds have proved self-defeating, containing perverse incentives to illiberal actions and appearing to authorize neo-imperial tutelage. But cosmopolitan anti-nationalists also find themselves in a paradoxical position, since nation-states provide the indispensable launching-pad for attempts to transcend nationalism.