Book dossier

Ethnic nationalism and the fall of empires

by Aviel Roshwald

Ethnic Nationalism and the Fall of Empire examines the critical dilemmas of nationalist politics in the first world war. The book focuses on a selection of case-studies drawn from events in the Habsburg, Romanov and Ottoman Empires, as well as the nation-states that arose form their break-up during, and in the aftermath of the First World War. It proposes that the events of the war itself catapulted nationalist movements into positions of authority well before the necessary cultural and institutional framework had had time to develop. The resulting crisis of political modernisation has reemerged in the late twentieth century and has been a fundamental threat to global stability.Ethnic Nationalism and the Fall of Empire includes examination of:* the role of intelligentsias* the effect of WW1 on the peoples of multi ethnic empires* the conflicts over how to define the boundaries of nationhood in the new post-war polities* the role of institutional continuity and the old elites in the evolution of the new nation states.