In
Marxism
Marxism is a left-wing to far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand class relations and social conflict and a dialectical ...
, bourgeois nationalism is the practice by the
ruling class
In sociology, the ruling class of a society is the social class who set and decide the political and economic agenda of society. In Marxist philosophy, the ruling class are the capitalist social class who own the means of production and by exte ...
es of deliberately dividing people by
nationality
Nationality is a legal identification of a person in international law, establishing the person as a subject, a ''national'', of a sovereign state. It affords the state jurisdiction over the person and affords the person the protection of the ...
,
race
Race, RACE or "The Race" may refer to:
* Race (biology), an informal taxonomic classification within a species, generally within a sub-species
* Race (human categorization), classification of humans into groups based on physical traits, and/or s ...
,
ethnicity, or
religion
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, ...
, so as to
distract them from engaging in
class struggle. It is seen as a
divide-and-conquer strategy used by the ruling classes to prevent the
working class
The working class (or labouring class) comprises those engaged in manual-labour occupations or industrial work, who are remunerated via waged or salaried contracts. Working-class occupations (see also " Designation of workers by collar colo ...
from uniting against them; hence the Marxist slogan, ''
Workers of all countries, unite!
The political slogan "Workers of the world, unite!" is one of the rallying cries from ''The Communist Manifesto'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels (german: Proletarier aller Länder, vereinigt Euch!, literally "Proletarians of all cou ...
''
Usage
Soviet Union
![Leonid Brezhnev Portrait (1)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ed/Leonid_Brezhnev_Portrait_%281%29.jpg)
After the
October Revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key mome ...
, the
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
government based its
nationalities
Nationality is a legal identification of a person in international law, establishing the person as a subject, a ''national'', of a sovereign state. It affords the state jurisdiction over the person and affords the person the protection of the ...
policy (
korenization) on the principles of
Marxism
Marxism is a left-wing to far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand class relations and social conflict and a dialectical ...
. According to these principles, all nations should disappear with time, and
nationalism
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: The ...
was considered a
bourgeois ideology. By the mid-1930s these policies were replaced with more extreme assimilationist and russification policies.
In his Report on the 50th anniversary of the formation of the
USSR
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
,
Leonid Brezhnev
Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev; uk, links= no, Леонід Ілліч Брежнєв, . (19 December 1906– 10 November 1982) was a Soviet politician who served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union between 1964 and ...
emphasized: "That is why Communists and all fighters for socialism believe that the main aspect of the national question is unification of the working people, regardless of their national origin, in the common battle against every type of oppression, and for a new social system which rules out exploitation of the working people."
China
![LiuShaoqi_Colour](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/LiuShaoqi_Colour.jpg)
Bourgeois nationalism as a concept was discussed by China's president,
Liu Shaoqi as follows:
See also
*
Class collaboration
Class collaboration is a principle of social organization based upon the belief that the division of society into a hierarchy of social classes is a positive and essential aspect of civilization.
Fascist support
Class collaboration is one of th ...
*
Liberal nationalism
Civic nationalism, also known as liberal nationalism, is a form of nationalism identified by political philosophers who believe in an inclusive form of nationalism that adheres to traditional liberal values of freedom, tolerance, equality, in ...
*
Lenin's national policy
The National Policy was a Canadian economic program introduced by John A. Macdonald's Conservative Party in 1876. After Macdonald led the Conservatives to victory in the 1878 Canadian federal election, he began implementing his policy in 1879. Th ...
*
Proletarian internationalism
Proletarian internationalism, sometimes referred to as international socialism, is the perception of all communist revolutions as being part of a single global class struggle rather than separate localized events. It is based on the theory that ...
, an
antonym of ''bourgeois nationalism''.
References
Further reading
Internationalism and Nationalismby Liu Shaoqi
Marxism and Nationalismby Tom Lewis
Ideology of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
Soviet phraseology
Marxist terminology
Political science terminology
Nationalism
Anti-nationalism
Diversionary tactics
Conflict (process)
Power (social and political) concepts
Bourgeoisie
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