ABSTRACT
The nation-state depends on nationalism in order to obtain the political loyalty of its citizens and their commitment to the two-fold task of the construction of the national society and community. These state nationalisms require the emergence of a national elite, and they activate the formation of a collective space-time identity. Both of these processes are later mirror-imaged by peripheral nationalisms. Alongside these "normalised" nationalisms there are reactive nationalisms, which are consequently centralist in nature. "Functional" reactive nationalisms emerge from the reaffirmation of the centre in response to opposition to its construction; or they may emerge from a reaction to a range of variables such as class struggle or the international status of the state. "Dysfunctional" state nationalisms are those which do not help in the construction of the centre; conservative rural movements and racists belong to this category. Peripheral nationalisms provoke centralist reactions in which state nationalism, in its turn, counter-imitates the methods used by them. These anti-peripheral nationalisms may operate within the sphere of the state, or they may be restricted to specific territories of the state in the form of local centralism. They may also emerge as mobilisations of the peripheries within the periphery against the latter, which acts as the centre.
