To explain how globalization rebuilt public policy and social behavior, we study the different political, economic, and social actors - public or private, individual or collective - and the exchanges and interactions between them that are remaking international relations. This course is inspired by a French sociological and historical approach to international relations. This course is also available in french version: www.coursera.org/learn/espace-mondial-fr/
A Concept Impossible to Export
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来自 Sciences Po 的课程
Espace mondial：法国视角下的国际研究
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从本节课中
Nation State
Is traditional nation-state still working everywhere around the world?
与讲师见面
Bertrand BadieProfessor
Marie-Françoise DurandProfessor
State has something particular:
it is the only kind of political system,
which is founded on rationality.
The legitimacy of the state is coming from
its special relation to rationality,
all the other kinds of political systems
are different,
some of them are based on tradition,
some others on charisma,
but state is considered, first of all,
as a rational expression
of the political order.
For this reason,
state is supposed to be universal,
for this reason, state must be extended
in all the parts of the world,
even if cultures, histories, social structures,
are quite different from the western model.
This exportation of the state model
took place in America, toward America
during the 19th century,
and toward Africa and Asia
with the decolonization process.
If we take into account
the American adventure,
the process was rather successful
for a very clear reason,
the main culture in America,
in North America, in South America
is coming from Europe,
and the main state builders
in all the parts of America
were trained as western leaders,
and were really trained
by the western culture they inherited.
Now it’s quite different
for the African and Asian case,
for many reasons,
and I would just point three reasons.
The first is a question of temporality.
Decolonization implies
to build a political system,
the independent political system,
the sovereign political system,
in a very short time.
The time of decolonization
is quite different from the time
of state building in Europe.
Keep in mind that the European,
the western nation state
was built according to a long process,
which lasted several centuries,
probably from the end of Middle Age
to the 19th century.
But Africa and Asia and in these continents,
those countries which were decolonized
didn’t have centuries for building
their own political system,
they didn’t have even some years,
they had, I would say, some minutes,
those minutes of the independence.
The second reason, the second factor,
is of course the western cultural hegemony,
which was very important, clear, obvious,
dense during the colonial period,
but even also at the time of decolonization.
That’s to say the only model
that the leaders of independence had in mind
was the Western model,
and for a nationalist,
an African nationalist
or for an Arab nationalist,
the political model
that they had to implement
was obviously the Western state model.
The third reason
is a reason of political hegemony,
that’s to say to be admitted
in the international arena
in the second part of the 20th century
– that’s to say
the very moment of decolonization –
implied to introduce itself as a state,
as a formal state.
If a new political system
wanted to be admitted at the UN
it had to present the main attributes
of the classical, traditional,
Western model of state.
These reasons transform
the state builders into importers,
and this is probably one of the main features
and the main ambiguities,
even one of the main contradictions
of decolonization.
It’s a contradiction because
a state builder was strongly nationalist,
and, however, he had to build in his society,
in his culture, a political system
which was imitating the political system
of the colonial power.
This strong contradiction is probably
at the basis of the process
which took place during decolonization.
These importers, were all of them socialized
by the western culture,
through Christian missions.
And you know how Christianity in Africa
contributed to socialize
and after to train the new leaders
like Julius Nyerere in Tanzania,
in Tanganyika in this time,
or for instance Fulbert Youlou
in the French Congo,
or the Baath nationalist leader Michel Aflak
who was trained in the Christian school.
So Christianity is an important agent
of this importation.
The second one is Western universities,
that’s to say the main nationalist leaders
went to Western universities
for being trained.
Nehru, the great Indian nationalist leader,
was trained in Cambridge,
or Kwame N’krumah who is considered
as one of the main progressive
and anti-western leader of Africa,
and who was the first president of Ghana
was trained in Lincoln University in the US.
And this is probably one of the main bases
of this contradiction, that’s to say,
the nationalist ideology in Africa and in Asia
was learnt in western universities
and was shaped according
to the main structures of meanings
which are the characteristics
of the western culture.
The third agent was the western parliament,
most of these leaders sitting
in the French or British parliament,
where they were trained like the
Ivory Coast leader Houphouët-Boigny,
who was even minister
in the French government of the Fourth Republic,
or Mamadou Dia and Léopold Sédar Senghor
in Senegal and so on.
And the fourth agent of socialization
are the Western parties, socialist party,
communist party,
which played a very important role
in socializing Sékou Touré in Guinea,
Hô Chi Minh who was attending
the congress of Tours in 1920 in which
was created the French communist party,
and we can add also Zhou Enlai
or Deng Zhao Ping who were trained in France
around this communist environment.
These importers were triggering
two kinds of importations,
what I would called
the conservative modernization
and what I would called
the revolutionary modernization.
Conservative modernization
is a way for keeping the throne
for the traditional princes who were
at power formally and informally
during the colonial rule,
and who try to save
their throne and their crown
by importing some elements
of this western culture,
for consolidating their power
and for bearing this new independence.
It’s the case of the Meiji Japan,
it’s the case of the Ottoman Empire,
which was westernized along the 19th century
for reinforcing an Ottoman power
which became more and more fragile,
it’s the case of Persia,
it’s the case of Siam, which was after Thailand,
it’s the case of Burma and so on.
And the revolutionary modernization
is the same importation
but not for consolidating traditional legitimacy,
but for breaking with traditional legitimacy,
and for building a state
on the basis of a new legitimacy
which was an imported one.
And this is another paradox,
that’s to say the revolutionary modernization
implied the mobilization
of the traditional elements
of the Western culture
for breaking with the traditional elements
of the traditional order
in Arab or African societies.
It’s the case for instance of Nasser in Egypt,
or the Baath party in Syria or in Iraq,
or the FLN in Algeria and so on.
Ladies and Gentlemen: I say the question,
can these importations be successful?
Is it possible to import a state
as someone would import a plant,
a factory of cars
or of different kinds of economic activities?
Of course not.
This importation was widely a failure.
It’s a failure because
these imported institutions
were not legitimate.
It’s very difficult to conceive
the legitimacy of a political order
which is not generated from inside
but which is imported from outside.
That’s why, in the new states,
in Africa or Asia
and especially in the Arab world
the civil society,
and even the traditional civil society,
appears nowadays as more legitimate
than the political power,
because the political power seems to import
structures of meanings coming from abroad.
And in these situations
power is getting authoritarian,
the less a power is legitimate,
the more it is authoritarian.
This is probably the main source
of authoritarianism that we can find
in newly independent countries.
And for these reasons also,
this power is affected
by a strong extraversion,
that’s to say
why they are not legitimate inside,
they have to look for outside
some new resources,
that’s why these new leaders
are paradoxically
more dependent on the powers,
western powers or also eastern powers.
This is also, as we will see later,
one of the sources of collapsing states
and of war societies that we can observe
in Africa or in the Arab world or even in Asia.
That’s why this contradiction
between a state coming from abroad
and a pressure coming from the local society
is one of the main features of this new world
and this new cleavage North versus South.
