Why I am a nationalist

There are three attitudes you can take to the world around you. You can be nationalist or patriotic, caring about your country as a whole and trying to improve it. You can be self-interested, caring for yourself and perhaps your family. Or you can care about the poor in your country, and try to improve their position. Just for a simple label, let’s call this being a socialist.

Garibaldi, another bearded nationalist

 Some people think there is a fourth position: being an internationalist and caring about the world as a whole. There are some saints who truly act on this ideal, but they are few. Most people who call themselves internationalist behave quite like self-interested people. In other words, internationalism is hot air. There is a reason for this. Helping people is not achieved by sitting and wishing it. It requires institutions and organizations. The most important mutual help organizations in the modern world are nation-states. Without these, internationalism is reduced to good intentions.*

So, the important choice is between attitudes to the state we are in. Should we spend our energy trying to make our nation better for everyone, or should we try to make it more equal, giving more to the poor and taxing the rich?

I forgot self-interest. Though I am certainly no less selfish than other people, I don’t find selfishness attractive as a philosophy of life. I cannot prove it is wrong, so I will leave it at that.

Helping the poor might seem noble, but the struggle between poor and rich is zero-sum. Redistribution cannot make us all richer, and too much redistribution can even make us all poorer. In the 19^th century, the poor might starve. Fighting for them made sense, since a dollar redistributed was worth much more to the poor person. In rich countries in the 21^st century, poverty is relative. That does not make it trivial, but it does mean the problems of poverty are complex and cannot be solved by redistribution alone. Otherwise we would have already solved them, since all modern democracies redistribute massively.

Nationalism, on the other hand, means trying to make your nation stronger and better. Doing this benefits everyone in your country. So, it is better to be a nationalist than a socialist (in the broad sense of trying to improve the position of the poor). Nationalism potentially benefits everyone. Socialism helps the poor but harms the rich.

Nationalism can go too far, so that we try to benefit our country at a cost to other countries, for example, by fighting wars of conquest. Some people think that we should separate patriotism (good) from nationalism (bad). This is a mistake. It is like thinking that because you can be too tall, there are two kinds of height: good height and bad height. Nationalism and patriotism are two words for the same thing.

I could say “I am a patriot” but that sounds anodyne. Since nationalism is controversial today, whereas it ought to be less controversial than socialism, I prefer to say I am a nationalist. (Would you have read this post if it were entitled Why I am a patriot?)


* Of course, there are organizations dedicated to helping people internationally, like development NGOs. Some of these surely do wonderful work. Overall, though, their level of success is weak. After mountains of study, there is little evidence that international aid helps countries develop. It may even harm them, by supporting corrupt officials and politicians. One reason for this poor record is probably that well-intentioned outsiders fail to understand what is going on in the places they are trying to help.