European Identity - Individual, Group and Society - HumanitarianNet

BODERLINE EUROPEANS: NATIONALISMS AND FUNDAMENTALISMS 129nations it is in order to exploit them). Open nationalism has oppositeapproaches to these two points of view: on the one hand, it assumesthat personal choice, even if subordinated to certain conditions, makesaccessing and leaving one´s nationality possible; and on the other hand,even though it practices a specific intra-national solidarity —especially inorder to protect what it defines as nation— it is indeed open to aninternational solidarity which aims at guaranteeing all human beings thegoods with which they can meet their needs with dignity 1 .Fourthly, remembering the nature of national sovereignty, there arenationalisms which only advocate ad extra self-determination in frontof the other nations making it compatible with diverse forms ofinternal absolutism of political power. Others, however, believe that adextra self-determination is only ethically justified when it is accompaniedby ad intra self-determination, that is, when co-nationals enjoypersonal autonomy and, from it, decide democratically.If we group together all the preceding distinctions into two columns,one expressing the positive dimension and the other the negative ordangerous one, we have, on the one hand, a type of nationalism that isdefined as culturalist, faint, open, which assumes ad intra as well as adextra self-determination. This is a democratic, liberal and social kind ofnationalism, which domineering violence hates. On the other hand, wehave the biologicist type of nationalism: dense, closed, claimant for adextra self-determination whilst it ignores or even represses ad intra selfdetermination.The tendency towards fanaticism, exclusion and domineeringviolence in this type of nationalism is extremely high. The realexisting nationalisms stand between these two extremes that have justbeen described. Variety —depending on how the different aspects thathave been mentioned are combined— is immense. Let us think, forexample, on the nationalism in Quebec, ETA’s, Catalonia´s, the one ledby Bush or Milosevic, the Norwegian, Le Pen´s, the nationalism of theSpanish or French socialists, the one of certain indigenous peoples,Scotland’s... This means that one cannot make generalised valuejudgements about nationalism, because in it dwell both constructiveand destructive forces. Value judgements, thus, should only be made oneach specific instance of nationalism. This is something which will haveto be greatly taken into consideration when we refer to nationalismsand European construction.1I have explained the meaning of being open to international justice —something Iconsider especially relevant when it comes to defining European identity— in “InternationalDistributive Justice”, in Etxeberría, X, Martínez Navarro, E & Teitelbaum, A (2000), Etica yderechos humanos en la cooperación internacional. Bilbao: Deusto University, 13-32.