The Virtue of Nationalism

by Yoram Hazony

Overview

A leading conservative thinker argues that a nationalist order is the only realistic safeguard of liberty in the world today

Nationalism is the issue of our age. From Donald Trump's "America First" politics to Brexit to the rise of the right in Europe, events have forced a crucial debate: Should we fight for international government? Or should the world's nations keep their independence and self-determination?

In The Virtue of Nationalism, Yoram Hazony contends that a world of sovereign nations is the only option for those who care about personal and collective freedom. He recounts how, beginning in the sixteenth century, English, Dutch, and American Protestants revived the Old Testament's love of national independence, and shows how their vision eventually brought freedom to peoples from Poland to India, Israel to Ethiopia. It is this tradition we must restore, he argues, if we want to limit conflict and hate — and allow human difference and innovation to flourish.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781541645370
Publisher:	Basic Books
Publication date:	09/04/2018
Pages:	304
Sales rank:	460,583
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Yoram Hazony is president of the Herzl Institute in Jerusalem and director of the John Templeton Foundation's project in Jewish Philosophical Theology. His books include The Jewish State: The Struggle for Israel's Soul and The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture. He lives in Jerusalem.

Table of Contents

Introduction: A Return to Nationalism 1

Part 1 Nationalism and Western Freedom

I Two Visions of World Order 16

II The Roman Church and Its Vision of Empire 21

III The Protestant Construction of the West 23

IV John Locke and the Liberal Construction 29

V Nationalism Discredited 37

VI Liberalism as Imperialism 43

VII Nationalist Alternatives to Liberalism 50

Part 2 The Case for the National State

VIII Two Types of Political Philosophy 58

IX The Foundations of Political Order 61

X How Are States Really Born? 76

XI Business and Family 82

XII Empire and Anarchy 90

XIII National Freedom as an Ordering Principle 99

XIV The Virtues of the National State 109

XV The Myth of the Federal Solution 141

XVI The Myth of the Neutral State 155

XVII A Right to National Independence? 167

XVIII Some Principles of the Order of National States 176

Part 3 Anti-Nationalism and Hate

XIX Is Hatred an Argument against Nationalism? 190

XX The Shaming Campaigns against Israel 192

XXI Immanuel Kant and the Anti-Nationalist Paradigm 196

XXII Two Lessons of Auschwitz 202

XXIII Why the Enormities of the Third World and Islam Go Unprotested 209

XXIV Britain, America, and Other Deplorable Nations 214

XXV Why Imperialists Hate 219

Conclusion: The Virtue of Nationalism 225

Acknowledgments 235

Notes 237

Index 275

Editorial Reviews

08/13/2018
Herzl Institute president Hazony (The Jewish State: The Struggle for Israel’s Soul) argues that nationalism, by which he means support of national sovereignty, is preferable to globalization, which he considers imperialist. Critics of recent populist movements consider nationalism to be rooted in racism and xenophobia, but Hazony defines it as opposition to supranational hegemony, a nation-level live-and-let-live policy. Whereas Nazi Germany is usually cited as the epitome of nationalism gone awry, Hazony argues that Hitler’s attempt to form a Third Reich over Europe was not dissimilar to the Catholic empires of the Middle Ages; in the author’s view, the founding of modern Israel in 1948 was a nationalistic response to the horrors of imperialism. The European Union and the United States are pursuing imperialist projects, he argues, and their focus on imposing one vision of the good at the expense of nations’ self-determination puts “the entire Protestant order in jeopardy.” His response to claims that nationalism leads to bigotry and hatred is to say that such behavior also exists among “anti-nationalists” and is more a feature of human nature than specific to nationalism. Though Hazony’s cynical views of Catholicism and the liberal world order, not to mention his waving away the behaviors and beliefs of self-identified nationalists, might strike some as controversial, this is on the whole a thought-provoking book. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

"A new book that will become a classic.... Yoram Hazony has written a magnificent affirmation of democratic nationalism and sovereignty. The book is a tour de force that has the potential to significantly shape the debate between the supporters of supranational globalism and those of national-state democracy."—National Review

"One of the most important books on one of the most important controversies of our time."—New Criterion

"[Hazony] cogently argues in the book that anyone who values his freedom should reject universalism and fight for a future of nations... [an] excellent book."—City Journal

"Hazony is both erudite and well reasoned."—American Conservative

"The Virtue of Nationalism is a brilliant achievement, at once learned and sharp, philosophical and politically engaged."—Jewish Review of Books

"A concise, thoughtful, strongly put case that resurgent nationalism is reason not for concern but for relief."—New York Sun

"Hazony presents a vigorous case for nationalism and its virtues."—National Interest

"The catastrophic failure of the liberal program opens the way for a new kind of political thinking, and Hazony offers a timely contribution to the debate."—Tablet

"Important.... Hazony continues to do a service in reviving the theory of nationalism at a moment when its empirical manifestations have become impossible to ignore. He also presents a model of engaged political philosophy—learned yet accessible, spirited but not excessively hostile."—Modern Age

"A thought-provoking book."—Publishers Weekly

"In an era when the word 'nationalism' falls on many ears as an insult and condemnation, Yoram Hazony recalls the ancient, essential, and even noble origins of the nation. I expect and hope this provocative and deeply learned book will incite fierce debate, but the depth and persuasiveness of its defense of the virtue of nations will demand engagement by every reader concerned with serious political ideas. Hazony masterfully blends a deep grasp of history, political philosophy, theology, and common sense with originality and clarity in what will be one of the most-discussed books of this dawning new age of the nation."—Patrick Deneen, professor of political science, University of Notre Dame, and author of Why Liberalism Failed

"In this engaging and deeply learned book, Yoram Hazony explores the religious and historical roots of nationalism, illuminates its modern accomplishments, and thereby offers a uniquely insightful guide to the forces transforming the politics of the West."—Yuval Levin, editor of National Affairs and author of The Fractured Republic

"To cosmopolitans on the right and left, the division of the world into sovereign nation-states is a lamentable fact we must strive to overcome. In The Virtue of Nationalism, Yoram Hazony demonstrates that it is in fact essential to human flourishing."—Reihan Salam, executive editor, National Review

"Yoram Hazony's book is profound as well as accessible and well-crafted, reflecting years of inquiry and reflection into a subject of unparalleled importance. Political figures, scholars, and the broader public will have to think carefully about this remarkable book."—Natan Sharansky, author of The Case for Democracy and Defending Identity

"Yoram Hazony's The Virtue of Nationalism belongs among the great works of political theory. Hazony presents a radical, even dangerous thesis: what if nationalism is not the scourge that today's left views it as, but rather the best hope humanity has? The Virtue of Nationalism mounts a necessary challenge to the liberal order of the day."—Batya Ungar-Sargon, opinion editor of The Forward

From the Publisher

2018-06-18
Israeli academic Hazony (The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture, 2012, etc.), president of the Herzl Institute, offers a full-throated defense of nationalism as a guarantor of liberty.Describing himself as "a Jewish nationalist, a Zionist, all my life," the author argues that nationalism—the self-determination of nations, free to follow their own interests without interference—stands in sharp distinction to imperialism, which aims to unite humankind into a single polity. Today's "globalism," he claims, is only a variant on the imperialism of old, and the hated European Union might just as well be an extension of the old Holy Roman Empire. Hazony takes a Wilsonian view of the right of nations to exercise self-government, though the term "nation" becomes a slippery beast: Can it embrace outgroups without being imperial? Nationalism sometimes maps to bigotry and hatred. Here, the author's argument is somewhat disingenuous, in that the kind of nationalism people find objectionable these days is of the supremacist sort, insisting not on self-determination but on primacy. Even so, Hazony writes that "imperialist" theories such as Marxism and liberalism also have their detractors, so that hatred "may be endemic to political movements in general." The author believes that walling off the world into nations is for the good of all humankind, organizing us by "tribal language and culture" to keep us safe from alien ideas that may be spreading faster than they should, "giving time for what is misguided and destructive to be tried and found wanting"—liberalism, presumably, or maybe the kind of international organization represented by NATO, which makes the president of the United States the de facto head of Europe's armed forces, which "is to say that the president, in effect, plays the role of the emperor in today's Europe." Given the current president's imperial flourishes, of course, that may just be enough to get him to abandon his own nationalism.An interesting but not always convincing exercise in political theory.

Kirkus Reviews