Reimagining the Nation-State: The Contested Terrains of Nation-Building

Traditional approaches to nationalism tend to exaggerate the antiquity of the nation-state while ignoring the 18th and 19th century origins of nation-building in western Europe and North America. Jim McLaughlin argues for a more grassroots, place-centred approach to understanding nation building in the works of key theorists such as Gellner, Hecter, Nairn and Smith, and puts forward an alternative dialectical model grounded in historical and geographical specificity. Using Ireland as a case study, he locates Irish nationalism and Ulster unionism in a variety of clearly defined regional and social class contexts. Emphasising the strategic and symbolic significance of place , McLaughlin identifies certain areas as nationalist or unionist heartlands while others remain contested terrain over which both sides continue to disagree.