Nationalism, Citizenship, and European Integration Strategies

This paper explores the relationship between the nation, nationalism, citizenship and European integration strategies. It addresses the problem of the relationship between the ‘national’ and ‘civil’ aspects of the existing nation state and the problem of separating the national from the civil in some justifications of transnational political integrations. It also examines the thesis of some authors who claim that both the nation and the state are obstacles to asserting citizenship as a universal status in the freedom and equality of all. In fact, it analyses the crucial issue whether a transnational political organisation is possible as a ‘community of citizens‘ in line with the concept of ‘constitutional patriotism‘, or as an international community in the sense of a ‘Society of Peoples‘ with the ‘right of nations‘ under the assumptions of political liberalism or of a properly ordered state government. The author also analyses the concept of ‘nationalism‘ and the unjustifiableness of its proscription per se. In the final section, he comments on and analyses the observed national (nationalistic) strategies of European integration