Dimensions of nationalism: structure of nationalist attitudes in two cities in Hungary and Serbia

Nationalism is often described as internally homogenous, unidimensional, and stable ideology, distinctively specific for certain groups (nations), as expressed in the familiar distinction between the 'Eastern' and 'Western' nationalism. The paper critically examines to what extent such generalizations are theoretically and empirically justified. The empirical analysis deals with the comparison of the number, content, and interrelationships of nationalist attitude dimensions, based on samples from Hungary (Szeged) and Serbia (Subotica). The results show that nationalist attitudes are multidimensional, and that the number and content of the dimensions varies in two countries. In the Serbian sample, the dimensions of romantic nationalism and ethnocentric nationalism tend to converge into a single nationalist-ethnocentric dimension. National attitudes in Hungary can be described along three dimensions: national discrimination, romantic nationalism, and national 'closedness'. The implications of the obtained results for theorizing nationalism are also discussed