Synopsis:
In his essay on nationalism, George Orwell paints a picture of the cerebral underpinnings of the contemporaneous forms of nationalism which existed in Britain in 1945. Orwell identifies three distinct branches of nationalism which he identifies as positive, transferred, and negative nationalism. He then divides each branch into sub-branches, which he elaborates further. Orwell faults innate psychological delusions of grandeur as the arch cause of nationalism in societies.
Excerpts:
“Those who are loudest in denouncing the German concentration camps are often quite unaware, or only very dimly aware, that there are also concentration camps in Russia.
“Indifference to objective truth is encouraged by the sealing-off of one part of the world from another, which makes it harder and harder to discover what is actually happening.
“Inside the intelligentsia, the pressure of public opinion is overwhelming. Nationalistic loyalty towards the proletariat, and most vicious theoretical hatred of the bourgeoisie, can and often do co-exist with ordinary snobbishness in everyday life.
“The majority of pacifists either belong to obscure religious sects or are simply humanitarians who object to taking life and prefer not to follow their thoughts beyond that point. But there is a minority of intellectual pacifists whose real though unadmitted motive appears to be hatred of western democracy and admiration for totalitarianism.
“The emotional urges which are inescapable, and are perhaps even necessary to political action, should be able to exist side by side with an acceptance of reality. But this, I repeat, needs a moral effort.
*All excerpts have been taken from Notes on Nationalism, Penguin Modern Classics.
Strategic Studies Book Club 