Nationalism and the Marketplace of Ideas

Nationalism andthe 1 Marketplace o f Ideas Jack Snyder and Karen Ballentine T h e conventional wisdom among human rights activistsholds that a great deal of the ethnicconflict in the world today is caused by propagandistic manipulations of public opinion . Human Rights Watch, for example, points the finger at unscrupulous governments who try to save their own slunsby "playing the communalcard." As antidotes, such groups prescribedemocratization,wide-open debate in civil society, and greater freedom of the press.' Scholarslikewise argue that a major stimulus to belligerent nationalism is the state's manipulation of mass media and mass education to infuse the nation with a sense of in-group patriotism and out-group rivalry? They, too, prescribe greater freedom of ~peech.~ We agree that media manipulation often plays a central role in promoting nationalist and ethnic conflict, but we argue that promoting unconditional JackSnyder is Professor of Political Science and Director of theInstitute of Warand Peace Studies, Columbia University. Karen Ballentine is a Ph.D. candidate in political science at Columbia University and in 1996-97 will be a Research Fellow at the Center for Science in International Affnirs, Harvard University. We thank Fiona Adamson, Laura Belin, Mark Blyth, Vl? Cagnon, sumit Ganguly, Robert Jervis, Arvid Lukauskas, Edward Mansfield, Anthony Marx, Helen Milner, Alexander Motyl, Anne Nelson , Bruce Pannier, Laura Pitter, Ronald Rogowski, Aaron Seeskin, Robert Shapiro, Kevin Smead, Stephen Van Evera, Robin Varghese, and Leslie Vinjamuri for helpful comments or other assistance, and the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, the Institute for the Study of World Politics, and the Pew Charitable Trusts for financial support. 1. Human Rights Watch, Playing the "Communal Card" (New York Human Rights Watch, April 1995), reprinted as Slaughter among Neighbors: The Political Origins of Communal Violence (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1995);Human Rights Watch, "'Hate Speech and Freedom of Expression," Free Expression Project, Vol. 4, No. 3 (March 1992); see also Leonard Sussman, Press Freedom 1996: TheJournalist as Pariah (New York Freedom House, 1996);Article 19,the International Centre Against Censorship, Guidelines for Election Broadcasting in Transitional Democracies (London: Article 19, August 1994). 2. Eric Hobsbawm, "Mass Producing Traditions," in Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, eds., The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 26S307; Eric Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780 (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1990), pp. 8C-100, 141-142; Stephen Van Evera, "Hypotheses on Nationalism and War," Znternational Security, Vol. 18,No. 4 (Spring 1994),pp. 26-33; Paul Kennedy, "The Decline of Nationalistic History in the West, 19OC-1970,"Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 8, No. 1 (January 1973), pp. 77-100. Vl? Cagnon, Jr., "Ethnic Conflict as Demobiker: The Case of Serbia," Institute for European Studies Working Paper No. 96.1 (Cornell University, May 1996),argues that propaganda does not mobilize popular nationalism, but rather that ethnic conflict and media control demobilizes opposition to the regime. 3. Van Evera, "Hypotheses," p. 37; Vl? Gagnon, Jr.,"Ethnic Nationalism and International Conflict: The Case of Serbia," International Security, Vol. 19, No. 3 (Winter 1994/95), pp. 13G166,at 165. ~~ ~ International Security, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Fall 1996),pp. 5 4 0 0 1996 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. International Security 22:2 1 6 freedom of public debate in newly democratizing societies is, in many circumstances , likely to make the problem worse. Historically and today, from the French Revolution to Rwanda, sudden liberalizations of press freedom have been associated with bloody outbursts of popular nationalism. The most dangerous situation is precisely when the government’spress monopoly begins to break down.4During incipient democratization, when civil society is burgeoning but democratic institutions are not fully entrenched, the state and other elites are forced to engage in public debate in order to compete for mass allies in the struggle for power.5Under those circumstances, governments and their opponents often have the motive and the opportunity to play the nationalist card. When this occurs, unconditional freedom of speech is a dubious remedy,Just as economic competition produces socially beneficial results only in a well-institutionalized marketplace, where monopolies and false advertising are counteracted , so too increased debate in the political...