() — The American right wing, long identified with the conservative movement, is increasingly clinging to something very different — nationalism — that scares some history students but inspires a new generation of Republicans.
Some recent examples:
- Presenting his platform in a series of videos, former President Donald Trump accuses a “globalist class” not to put America first.
- Amidst the wreckage of ousted Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s cable career lies a journey from run-of-the-mill conservative to outspoken white nationalist.
- A congressional representative with a promising career calls for the Republican Party to be “the party of nationalism.”
These moments, which seem bland to a regular news consumer, remind us that the Republican Party has fought for decades to reconcile its internal association of nationalists and conservatives. If you’ve just woken up to American politics in the last 30 years, the two terms seem synonymous, but they haven’t always been.
Nationalism is identity over philosophy
So what is a nationalist and what is a conservative? And what does it matter if we use these terms interchangeably?
First, a quick definition: when scholars use “nationalism” by itself, it’s the concept that some kind of identity matters more than philosophy. That can be a place, an ethnicity or a religion. In current American politics, we typically see that identity with Christian nationalism or white nationalism.
Defining conservatism is tricky
Whether it goes back to the philosopher Edmund Burke or begins with former President Ronald Reagan, conservatism has generally meant a resistance to radical change and a faith in precaution, especially when it comes to the role of government in the life of a citizen.
Many conservatives bristle at being lumped in with the very idea of nationalism, even without add-ons like “Christian” or “white.” His version of conservatism is independent of place.
Former Executive Vice President of the Heritage Foundation, Kim Holmes, argued in 2019 that “American conservatives say that one of the best things about America is that it is different from every other country. Different from all other nationalisms”.
Embrace nationalism under Trump
Trump turned that more outspoken tenet of conservatism on its head when he declared himself a “nationalist” in 2018. Most of his policy proposals as president focused on putting “America First.”
For Holmes, American identity is “based on a universal creed… based on the founding principles of the United States.” Holmes sees kindred spirits and a shared struggle with conservatives in other parts of the world who might share those principles.
Wasn’t always partisan
Conservatism as a concept was not even partisan in the 20th century. Joe Biden adopted the term during his first term in the US Senate and he told Kitty Kelley of the Washingtonian in 1974: “When it comes to civil rights and civil liberties, I’m a liberal, but that’s about it. I’m pretty conservative on most other issues.”
Over time, the term has evolved. As Lee Drutman, a political scientist at the think tank New America and author of “Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America,” told me, “There was once a consistent meaning, but now you can be a security conservative. national, an economic conservative, a social conservative. It has become more of an identity.”
Holmes said that when conservatives lose confidence in the strength of their philosophy, they risk becoming an identity. “They think that traditional fusionist conservatism and the idea of American exceptionalism are not strong enough. These ideas are not muscular enough. They want something stronger to counter the universal claims of globalism and progressivism that they believe are un-American.”
An alliance is forged
Such an association between nationalism and conservatism, argues Angie Maxwell, a professor of political science at the University of Arkansas, was forged in the mid-20th century as the Republican Party worked to break the Democratic Party’s hold on the South since Reconstruction. until the end of the 20th century.
“We see the Republican Party trying to embrace the specific brand of southern white conservatism,” he said.
Maxwell said that while the party was divided on the strategy, several Republican campaigns said they could attract voters by emphasizing Christian values, anti-feminism and racial resentment. In the 1960s, he noted, sentiments on those three dynamics would be evenly divided among members of both parties, whereas today those views are disproportionately felt by Republican voters.
Which brings us to today, where Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Republican of Georgia, clearly says, “We need to be the party of nationalism and I’m a Christian, and I say that with pride, we need to be Christian nationalists.”
“There is nothing conservative about Marjorie Taylor Greene, if conservative means we must tread carefully, we must not blow things up, we must have restraint and humility,” argued Drutman, recalling Burke, who is considered by many to be the founder of modern conservatism. . “In some ways, (former President Barack) Obama is much more of a Burkean conservative.”
What awaits us
Drutman noted that some forms of nationalism are benign: “It can be argued that that’s what’s great about America: that we have a diverse and pluralistic society, (that) America is the greatest nation in the world because we welcome everyone.” .
What worries Drutman is the kind of nationalism driven by Greene’s identity.
“What has changed in our politics is the extent to which our political divisions have led us to view opposing views as illegitimate. For half the country to treat the other half like it’s a threat,” Drutman said. “Maybe there are some issues where we should be more conservative. They become dangerous when their adherents deny that there is a legitimate opposition.”
That also worried Holmes, writing in 2019 before Greene was elected, when she warned: “Nationalism lacks a common idea or principle of government, except that a people or a nation-state can be almost anything. It can be fascist, it can be authoritarian, it can be totalitarian or it can be democratic”.
