Maia Ramnath - Decolonizing Anarchism.pdf - Libcom

Decolonization I 19
overlords and underdogs? While nationalism lies at the root
of many evils, its emotional force and historical significance
for freedom fighters cannot be ignored, and so the notion of
national liberation struggle requires some attention.
Indian Marxist literary theorist Aijaz Ahmad took
Perry Anderson to task in an essay for stating that "all third
world literature is nationalist literature."] The same objection
could be made regarding the historiography, not just
the literature, of the global South. Periodized in terms of
precolonial, colonial, and postcolonial, a nationalist narrative
moves from primordial purity to unjust enslavement
to destined redemption. A cycle of restoration and rebirth,
combined with a linear progression toward teleological fulfillment,
results in a triumphal spiral toward statehood: the
destination for the nation's journey, sign of its legitimacy,
and guarantor of its autonomy and well-being.
The fundamental assumption of nationalism is that in
order for a people to be recognized as holders of collective
rights and freedoms, it must be constituted as a nation
duly manifested in a state: an exclusive institution defined
by its monopoly on sanctioned force and revenue extraction.
A state is, in the starkest terms, a mechanism designed
to accumulate wealth in order to make war, to make war in
order to protect its wealth, and to make laws to facilitate
its functioning, meaning to protect its own stability. This
includes the maintenance of a reasonable degree of contentment
among its members; the liberal or social democratic
state adds the requirement of legitimation either by formal
mechanisms of consent for its members or its claim to
serve the members' common welfare. Therefore, the only