Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, ethnonationalism has
left its indelible mark on Europe and every other continent. The latest
events in the Balkans, in central and eastern Europe, and in the former
Soviet Union unequivocally testify to the power and influence of
ethnonationalism at the end of the second millennium. What forces make
people so committed to their ethnonational groups that they are ready to
ignore all other concerns, first and foremost the rights and interests
of people of other ethnicities? What is the social psychological and
anthropological underpinning of ethnonationalism? And finally; why and
how do people adhere to nation- alist attitudes and beliefs? These
questions are virtually impossible to avoid for anyone who has directly
felt the impact of ethnonationalism, but they also present them- selves
to anyone who has indirectly experienced the prejudices unleashed by
ethnonationalist forces. This book attempts to answer all these
questions by focusing on national feeling and the social psychological
and anthropological founda- tions that underly the sense of belonging
that is essential to nationalism. No matter how qualitatively different
nationalist attitudes and beliefs are from national sentiment, the
latter has to be considered in any study of national- ism.