C1063 Nationalism (1/2)
What is nationalism? If you flip through the textbooks, you will find large sections of cryptic text, as well as various nouns surrounded by cloud mountain fog.
However, Xiao Letian's understanding of nationalism was very simple, and also pointed directly at the core of the problem. The rise of the so-called nationalism was actually just a tool used by the state to unite the human and material forces of the people.
Humans themselves were very contradictory. On the one hand, humans needed to integrate into society and gather together to keep warm. On the other hand, humans had the advantage of being afraid that the collective would harm their own property and interests.
To give an example, humans are just a bunch of hedgehogs in the cold winter. They need to embrace each other to keep warm but they are afraid of hurting each other.
However, with the continuous evolution of human history and the gradual development of society, regardless of whether you like the existence of large groups or not, you cannot deny the fact that people have great power, and unity is the reality of power.
The land was huge and the population was large. Together, they would create a powerful group, and this group would not only provide protection and external expansion to all the people, but also forcefully deprive every individual within the group of part of their private interests.
This is the contradiction, irreconcilable contradiction, people not only need the sense of security and the right to expand, but also want to maintain their own self-interest without losing it, it is this kind of conflict that causes many chaos in society.
From the point of view of human nature, when would humans be willing to give their own personal benefits? Actually, it was just the following situations.
The first person to enjoy personal benefits was obviously himself. This was an animal instinct of humans, and the second was the family. The majority of people were willing to give up their own benefits for their parents, wife, and children.
The third level belonged to the main clan. They were connected by blood and had the same surname, so it was acceptable for them to suffer losses and be taken advantage of by the main clan.
The fourth floor was made up of townspeople with the same accent, the same habits, and the same attitude towards others. The so-called village party was already considered a national concept.
Above that was the nation and the country. People had a common belief, a common language, and a common value. Because there was a lot of commonality, they could suppress the grievance that their self-interest had suffered, thus preventing this large group from collapsing.
The above is only a narrow view of the nation, and nationalism is based on this concept of sublimation, some thinkers began to consciously comb, dig, organize and form a set of theory, and then within the same people to promote more people to accept.
Why do we need nationalism? It is precisely because we need a more advanced means of solidarity with humanity. How many people could be united by the clan and clan? The smaller clans had a hundred or two hundred people, while the larger clans had a thousand or two thousand people. It was possible to dominate a county, but how could a larger region be controlled?
Using a village party to unite people? If you could unite hundreds of thousands of people, that would be the end of it. The tribes formed in ancient times were a manifestation of this pattern.
What is higher than the clan and the village party? The rise of Western nationalism was because many intelligent people had figured out the rules behind it. They had explored the commonality of the nation, starting with religion, language, customs, history and so on. Eventually, they could unite into tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars.
The combat power unleashed by a human on such a large scale was quite terrifying. It could suppress internal conflicts and external struggles, allowing people to fight for more benefits in return for their own people.