: Michael Ignatieff
: Blood& Belonging Journeys into the New Nationalism
: Pushkin Press
: 9781782279112
: 1
: CHF 8.40
:
: Politisches System
: English
: 352
: Wasserzeichen
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB
Reissue of an incisive exploration of the many faces of modern nationalism by the esteemed author of On ConsolationIn 1993 Michael Ignatieff set out on a journey to the former Yugoslavia, Ukraine, Germany, Quebec, Kurdistan and Northern Ireland in order to explore the many faces of modern nationalism. Why, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War, were so many nation states disintegrating into ethnic conflict? What did nationalism promise, that so many were willing to shed blood in the name of an idea of belonging?In a stimulating mix of interviews, history and evocative reportage, Ignatieff provides a searching analysis of the brutal conflicts and powerful fantasies produced by ethnic nationalism, and questions the possibility of a nationalism based on shared civic values. Reissued with a new preface, Blood& Belonging is a nuanced, fascinating account of one of our era's defining political issues.

Michael Ignatieff is a writer, historian and former politician. He has taught at Cambridge, Oxford, the University of Toronto and Harvard and is currently university professor at Central European University in Vienna. His books, which have been translated into twelve languages, include Blood& Belonging, Isaiah Berlin, The Needs of Strangers and The Russian Album, all published or forthcoming with Pushkin Press, and On Consolation.

​WARLORDS


The UN checkpoint was a sandbagged Portakabin manned by two Canadian infantrymen guarding a road barrier between the Croat- and Serb-held sections of Pakrac, in central Croatia. The road to the checkpoint wound its way between pulverized bungalows, upended cars in the ditches, waist-high grass in abandoned gardens. Just visible in the grass, as we approached the checkpoint, were two teenage Croatian spotters with their binoculars trained on the Serbian side.

The UN had just waved us through into Serb-held territory when fifteen armed Serbian paramilitaries surrounded our van. They had been drinking at a wedding in their village. The drunkest one, with dead eyes and glassy, sweat-beaded skin, forced the van door open and clambered in. “We watching you,” he said, making binocular gestures with his hands. “You talk to Ustashe,” and he pointed back at the Croatians hiding in the grass. Then he took the pistol out of his belt. “You fucking spies,” he said. He ordered the driver out at gunpoint, took the wheel, and began revving the engine. “Why can’t I shoot this?” groaned the cameraman in the seat behind. “Because he’ll shootyou,” someone in the back of the van muttered.

The Serb put the van into gear and it was moving off when one of the UN soldiers yanked open the door, grabbed the keys, and shut off the ignition. “We’ll do this my way,” the UN soldier said, breathing heavily, half puffing, half cajoling the Serb out of the driver’s seat. Another young Serb in combat gear pushed his way into the van and shook his head. “I am police. You are under arrest. Follow me.”

This was the moment, in my journeys in search of the new nationalism, in which I began to understand what the new world order actually looks like: paramilitaries, drunk on plum brandy and ethnic paranoia, trading shots with each other across a wasteland; a checkpoint between them, placed there by something loftily called “the international community” but actually manned by just two anxious adolescents; and a film crew wondering, for a second or two, whether they were going to get out alive.

The writ of the “international community” ran no farther than 150 meters