Why did the nation-state proliferate across the world over the past 200 years, replacing empires, kingdoms, city-states, and the like? Using a new dataset with information on 145 of today's states from 1816 to the year they achieved nation-statehood, we test key aspects of modernization, world polity, and historical institutionalist theories. Event history analysis shows that a nation-state is more likely to emerge when a power shift allows nationalists to overthrow or absorb the established regime. Diffusion of the nation-state within an empire or among neighbors also tilts the balance of power in favor of nationalists. We find no evidence for the effects of industrialization, the advent of mass literacy, or increasingly direct rule, which are associated with the modernization theories of Gellner, Anderson, Tilly, and Hechter. Nor is the growing global hegemony of the nation-state model a good predictor of individual instances of nation-state formation, as Meyer's world polity theory would suggest. We conclude that the global rise of the nation-state is driven by proximate and contextual political factors situated at the local and regional levels, in line with historical institutionalist arguments, rather than by domestic or global structural forces that operate over the long dure´e.

Political scientists have acknowledged the importance of ethno-nationalism as a constitutive element of radical-right politics, but have typically empirically reduced the phenomenon to its downstream attitudinal correlates. Sociologists, on the other hand, have extensively studied nationalism, but have rarely weighed in on debates about institutional politics. In this study, we bring these literatures together by considering how nationalist beliefs shaped respondents' voting preferences in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and how the election outcome built on long-term changes in the distribution of nationalism in the U.S. population. The results suggest that competing understandings of American nationhood were effectively mobilized by candidates from the two parties, both in the 2016 primaries and the general election. Furthermore, over the past twenty years, nationalism has become sorted by party, as Republican identifiers have become predominantly ethno-nationalist and Democrats have increasingly endorsed creedal and disengaged conceptions of nationhood. This points to the rising demand for radical candidates among Republicans and suggests a potentially bleak future for U.S. politics, as nationalism becomes yet another among multiple overlapping social and cultural cleavages that serve to reinforce deep partisan divisions and undermine the stability of liberal democratic institutions.

Many studies have reported that US presidents often become more popular at the onset of wars and other security crises. Research on this “rally-round-the-flag” phenomenon has focused on either rational calculation of success, chances of military actions, popular perceptions of security threats, or the role of opinion leaders. This paper proposes a new approach: I argue that challenges to the symbolic status of the nation vis-à-vis other nations drive rally periods. This study examines the rally-round-the-flag phenomenon from a comparative historical perspective, using a new database of war events and security crises from 1950–2006. The analysis reveals that two types of status challenges result in nationalist rally reactions: first, the public has rallied behind presidents when wars and security crises were viewed as an opportunity for the United States to reclaim its previously damaged national honor; and second, rallies have emerged when the president claimed the mantle of “leader of the free world” in an internationally authorized coalition attack on a foreign country.

Political scientists have acknowledged the importance of nationalism as a constitutive element of radical-right politics, but have typically empirically reduced the phenomenon to specific out-group sentiments. Sociologists, in contrast, have devoted more attention to theorizing and operationalizing nationalism but have only sporadically engaged in debates about institutional politics. The present study brings these literatures together by considering how nationalist beliefs shaped respondents' voting preferences in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and how the election outcome built on long-term changes in the distribution of nationalism in the U.S. population. The results suggest that competing understandings of American nationhood were effectively mobilized by candidates from the two parties in both the 2016 primaries and the general election. Furthermore, over the past 20 years, nationalism has become sorted by party, as Republican identifiers have come to define America in more exclusionary and critical terms and Democrats have increasingly endorsed inclusive and positive conceptions of nationhood. These trends point to the rising demand for radical candidates among Republicans and suggests a potentially bleak future for U.S. politics, as nationalism becomes yet another among multiple overlapping social and cultural cleavages that serve to reinforce partisan divisions and undermine the stability of liberal democratic institutions.

No abstract