Nations and Nationalism Quotes

“It is nationalism which engenders nations, and not the other way round.”
― Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism

“Nationalism is primarily a political principle, which holds that the political and the national unit should be congruent.”
― Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism

“Nations as a natural, God-given way of classifying men, as an inherent though long-delayed political destiny, are a myth; nationalism, which sometimes takes pre-existing cultures and turns them into nations, sometimes invents them, and often obliterates pre-existing cultures: that is a reality, for better or worse, and in general an inescapable one. Those who are its historic agents know not what they do, but that is another matter.”
― Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism