Nation State, Nationalism and the Military

by Andreas Heizmann and Elmar Plozza under the direction of Rudolf Jaun, Military Academy at ETH Zurich and University of Zurich, 40

(French version p. 192) (German version p. 210)

War as a Factor of Nation-Building. An Overview Sketch to the Bibliography "Nation State, Nationalism and Military"

"War made the state, and the state made war" - With this formula, Charles Tilly tried to point out the interaction between organised violence and the development of the nation state". That states make war is a well known fact. On the other side - and this phenomenon shall be briefly analysed at this point - military factors also influence the building and the further development of nation states. The roots of the modern nation state lay in the late Middle Ages and the early modem times; and despite trans-national relations and supranational unification efforts, the today's world is still organised in nation states. Social scientists Wolfgang Knobel and Gunnar Schmidt are firmly convinced that war played a major role in the appearance of the nation state. They harshly criticise many of their colleagues in the social sciences: They reproach them for having ignored the contradiction of the state modernisation process. On the contrary, Knobel and Schmidt emphasise that modernisation is not always a peaceful process. The two scientists reproach the modernisation-theory, which is popular in sociology, as "naive progress-optimism"42.

Peaceful nation state building is rare to find, also notes the well known social histo- rian Hans-Ulrich Wehler. As examples, Canada, the Caribbean states and Japan come to mind. However, more often we see the appearance of a modern nation related to war and revolution - such as the Netherlands: the gradual development of a Dutch identity occurred only after the Dutch revolution; the separation of the Netherlands from Spain. This included a long and bitter war against Catholic Spain and afterwards the War of Supremacy with England43.

Already before the model of the nation state imposed itself in Europe, war had a profound influence on the stately forms of organisation, especially conditioned through the technical progress in the military sector - a keyword in relation to this is the gunpowder revolution. The technique of war became increasingly expensive and the size of the armies increased. Through the military technical inventions linked to gunpowder (muskets and canons), cavalry lost its meaning in the ]5th and 16`"Ih centuries and infantry and artillery was developed. Equipment, training and maintenance of the troops - all these elements became through new weapons more expensive and more demanding44. The feudal lords could not cope with this new

40. Thanks to Jorg Echternkamp, Massimo de Leonardis, Pietro Del Negro, Piet Kamphuis, Maria Szabo and Christoph Tepperberg for completing their national bibliographies. 41. Charles Tilly, "Reflections on the History of European State-Making", in: Charles Tilly (ed.), The Formation ofNational-States in Western Europe, Princeton, 1975, p. 42. 42. Wolfgang Knobel; Gunnar Schmidt, "Einleitung: Warum brauchen wir eine Soziologie des Krie- ges?", in: Wolfgang Knobel; Gunnar Schmidt (ed.), Die Gegenwarl des Krieges: Staatliche Gewalt in der Moderne, Frankfurt am Main, 2000, p. 7-10. 43. Hans-Ulrich Wehler, "Nationalstaat und Krieg", in: Wemer Rosener (ed.), Staat und Krieg: Vom Mittelalter zur Moderne, Göttingen, 2000, p. 227-229. 44. Samuel E. Finer: "State- and Nation-Building in Europe: The Role of the Military", in: Charles Tilly (ed.), The Formation of National States in Europe, Princeton, 1975, p. 105-108. See: Michael military reality. The increasing financial need had to be covered through the establishment of functioning bureaucracies. This development strengthened the central state (in many cases the king) at the expense of regional and local power centres (feudal lords, princes, etc.). As Bruce Porter emphasises, only militarily strong states could impose themselves in this process. That is why the number of European states or state constructions decreased: in the 14`" century there were 1'000, in the year 1500 there were still approximately 500 "states", at the end of the 18'" century there were less than 350 and around the year 1900 there remained only 25 states . Otto Hintze situates the beginning of the era of militarism at the end of the 155' century, as the feudal age ended. The transition was marked by the ordered companies of Charles VII of . In regards to the art of war they were still an army of knights with secondary fighters, but they brought - concerning the political constitution - an important reform: they were the first standing army in Europe under the sovereignty of a king. of Burgundy and Maximilian of Austria imitated the model46. An important break in the interplay of stately structures and military activity was the Thirty Years War (1619-1648), which produced in its course armies of unexpected size for the period. Thus, according to Brian Downing, France's entry into the war became possible through the creation of a centralised administration and a disciplined and structured state body4'. The time of feudal warfare, carried out by the nobility, was definitely over.

The

It was the French Revolution, in the years 1789 to 1799, that brought the concept of the nation state to the fore. However, the creation of modern militarism goes back as much to the French Revolution as the nation state - concludes the historian Wolfgang Ruse 48 It was not only the readiness of the revolutionaries to defend the new order against supposed and actual enemies inside and outside the country that contributed to this. After the revolution the relation between society and military was also subject to an important new concept on a discursive level. In the centre of the new discourse was now the image of the citoyen soldat, the revolutionary citizen, who was in the meantime an armed fighter. With this concept, the old army, which continued from the time of the royal rule, should be integrated into the new order. The introduction of general compulsory military service in the year 1793 was an important milestone. However, soon it was not only about the integration of the military; in the second half of the 1790s the changed military was seen as much more as the guarantor of the revolution. French military journals drew an image, through which the military was declared as the exemplar of revolutionary virtues. Civil society, which follows only particular interests and lost its revolutionary ideals, must be renewed through the military. Bonaparte was the most important protagonist of this idea, and could, after his victorious Italian campaigns, continually extend his power position within the French state. Bonaparte's rule was marked by a strong belligerent military

Duffy (ed.), The Military Revolution and the State 1500-1800, Exeter, 1980; especially the introduc- tion gives a good overview of the theme. 45. Bruce D. Porter, War and the Rise of the State: The Military Foundations of Modern Politics, New York, 1994, p. 12 ff. 46. Otto Hintze, "Staatsverfassung und Heeresverfassung", in: Volker R. Berghahn (ed.), Militaris- mus. Koln, 1975, p. 71.1. 47. Brian M. Downing, The Military Revolution and Political Change: Origins of Democracy and Aulocracy in Early Modern Europe, Princeton N.J., 1992. 48. On the contrary, Otto Hintze described already the ending 15 century as the beginning of the era of militarism.