Nation-Building and Contested Identities: Romanian & Hungarian ...

Nationalizing Minorities and Homeland PoliticsIn this study, I am analyzing a national minority that was once partof a larger nation within the framework of one state. One of the consequencesof the dissolution of that state was that a part of that nationbecame a national minority in another state. The remaining part of theethnocultural nation, now a national minority, has not accepted the newsituation. It has continued the nation-building process, but it has reshapedit. Although this nation-building process is different from the former, itsmechanisms are similar. Ethnocultural bonds do not loose their strength,on the contrary, generally they are invigorated. Since the nation-buildingof the majority challenges the nation-building of the national minority, thestrengthening of the internal boundaries of the national minority is a logicalconsequence.Members of the national minority still consider themselves asbelonging to the former ethnocultural nation, emphasizing the commonculture and language. They used to perceive themselves as one nation, andstill conceive themselves in such a way. However, they also perceive themselvesas a national minority. National minorities are characterized bythese two complementary, but nevertheless competing, images. They areinstitutionalized on the same ethnocultural basis as the nation in theexternal homeland, but the framework and resources are different. Theparticular principle of nationality is identical, and therefore there is noreason to search for other explanations why a national minority is engagedin a nationalizing process.A nationalizing minority’s politics is oriented toward strengtheningand maintaining these ethnocultural boundaries. This is done by the creationof institutions for achieving the above-mentioned aims. It is thecreation of a parallel social and political system, and the struggle fora legal setting in which nationalization can continue in more favorableconditions. Similar to the nationalizing state, the nationalizing minorityfaces competing goals, which are channeled by its institutions and itspublic sphere. Obviously, the goals and policies are constrained by severalinternal and external factors. The nationalizing minority acts ina specific political arena, and not all the political actions of the nationalminority can be subsumed under this process. There are also processesthat have the opposite result and, from a different point-of-view, onecould also say that we are witnessing a process of disintegration.My account does not touch upon these processes. I only assume that thepolitical will of a nationalizing minority is a specific form of nationbuilding,and this will is organized along the lines of nation-building.The outcome will not necessarily be what nationalist politicians andintellectuals expect, as the conflict between and within nation-state andminority projects create unexpected political results.255