Comprehensive theory, key formulas, diagrams, and memory aids for Nationalism and Imperialism.
By the last quarter of the nineteenth century, nationalism no longer retained its idealistic liberal-democratic sentiment of the first half of the century, but became a narrow creed with limited ends. During this period, nationalist groups became increasingly intolerant of each other and ever ready to go to war. The major European powers, in turn, manipulated the nationalist aspirations of the subject peoples in Europe to further their own imperialist aims.
The most serious source of nationalist tension in Europe after 1871 was the area called the Balkans. The Balkans was a region of geographical and ethnic variation comprising modern-day Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Greece, Macedonia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, Serbia, and Montenegro whose inhabitants were broadly known as the Slavs. A large part of the Balkans was under the control of the Ottoman Empire.
The spread of the ideas of romantic nationalism in the Balkans together with the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire made this region very explosive. All through the nineteenth century, the Ottoman Empire had sought to strengthen itself through modernization and internal reforms but with very little success. One by one, its European subject nationalities broke away from its control and declared independence. The Balkan peoples based their claims for independence or political rights on nationality and used history to prove that they had once been independent but had subsequently been subjugated by foreign powers. Hence the rebellious nationalities in the Balkans thought of their struggles as attempts to win back their long-lost independence.
As the different Slavic nationalities struggled to define their identity and independence, the Balkan area became an area of intense conflict. The Balkan states were fiercely jealous of each other and each hoped to gain more territory at the expense of the others. Matters were further complicated because the Balkans also became the scene of big power rivalry.
During this period, there was intense rivalry among the European powers over trade and colonies as well as naval and military might. These rivalries were very evident in the way the Balkan problem unfolded. Each power – Russia, Germany, England, Austro-Hungary – was keen on countering the hold of other powers over the Balkans, and extending its own control over the area. This led to a series of wars in the region and finally the First World War.
Nationalism, aligned with imperialism, led Europe to disaster in 1914. Imperialism is the policy of extending a country's power and influence through diplomacy or military force, especially by acquiring colonies and establishing an empire. The intense competition for imperial supremacy fueled by aggressive nationalism made conflict inevitable.
But meanwhile, many countries in the world which had been colonized by the European powers in the nineteenth century began to oppose imperial domination. The anti-imperial movements that developed everywhere were nationalist, in the sense that they all struggled to form independent nation-states, and were inspired by a sense of collective national unity, forged in confrontation with imperialism. European ideas of nationalism were nowhere replicated, for people everywhere developed their own specific variety of nationalism. But the idea that societies should be organized into 'nation-states' came to be accepted as natural and universal.
The late nineteenth century saw a rapid expansion of European imperialism, particularly in Africa and Asia. The 'Scramble for Africa' refers to the period between the 1880s and the start of World War I, during which European powers aggressively partitioned the African continent among themselves. At the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885, European nations drew arbitrary borders across Africa, largely ignoring existing ethnic, linguistic, and cultural boundaries. Similarly, in Asia, powers like Britain, France, and the Netherlands expanded their colonial territories. Britain consolidated its hold over India, making it the "jewel in the crown" of the British Empire, while also expanding into Southeast Asia. France established a strong presence in Indochina (modern-day Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia).
Imperial rule was not accepted passively. Resistance movements sprang up across the colonized world. Some of these were early armed struggles or localized rebellions, while others took the form of modern political organizations. Over time, these anti-imperialist sentiments coalesced into strong nationalist movements. The shared experience of economic exploitation, political subjugation, and cultural marginalization provided a common ground for diverse groups within colonized territories to unite against the colonizers. The leaders of these movements, many of whom were educated in Western political thought, used the language of democracy, rights, and nationalism—originally developed in Europe—to challenge European rule and demand self-determination.
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, nationalism morphed from a liberal ideal into an aggressive and intolerant ideology that fueled imperial expansion and international rivalry. This shift was most violently realized in the Balkans, where local nationalisms clashed with the declining Ottoman Empire and the competing imperial ambitions of major European powers. This volatile mix of aggressive nationalism and imperialism ultimately plunged the world into the devastation of the First World War. Simultaneously, however, this era sowed the seeds of its own undoing, as the oppressive nature of imperialism sparked anti-colonial resistance across Asia and Africa, leading to the rise of new, diverse nationalist movements that would eventually dismantle the European empires.