Nationhood and self-determination

Stable, creating disagreement about the type of group mobilization present in a territory. In this case, to assist a peaceful mobilization, whatever shape it may assume, legal frameworks should be available to accommodate several possible scenarios in a transitional area. I discuss the issues associated with formulating a constitution for a transitional area in the next chapter. 

A group that has the intention of being determined by the conditions of its internal life needs to protect its freedom and acquire the form of control for doing so required by present circumstances. The group members have to formulate their intentions accordingly. This is why it is imperative to define a morally acceptable form of self-determination that is also practically possible and thus capable of becoming an international norm. 

Let us consider how this analysis applies to a group like the Roma who claim to be a non-territorial national group. To determine whether the Roma are a nation entitled to self-determination or an ethnic group that deserves only polyethnic rights 

In the next chapter, I consider how to treat group agents in transitional societies. I establish an applicable norm regulating the right to self-determination in Chapter 5, and in Chapter 61 show how it can be enforced. 

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Despite these positive features, however, the nation-state approach associates statehood with both nationhood and self-determination. Since international order is understood as being based on states, and since not all minority groups presently possess or can feasibly obtain a state of their own, this approach explicitly acknowledges the entitlements of only certain groups and thereby violates Cl. Defining nationhood to imply a necessary connection between nations and states leads to (1)... 

I win provide additional support for the introduction of self-determination as the central notion to consider for the regulation of relations among substate national groups in the next chapter, where 1 define nationhood and explain its relation to self-determination. 

In fact, even if the nation-state approach is taken as simply an account of how nations have formed historically, it is still incomplete, because it does not address those national groups that have not been completely assimilated and that make self-determination claims to this day. In my account of nationhood, I retain the three important features of the nation-state approach but disassociate statehood from nationhood, on the one hand, and from self-determination, on the other. 

Political elements of nationhood (such as claims to political autonomy or self-determination) are recognized by many authors,but their notions of nationhood also include other elements that go beyond this particular type of political culture. Thus, it could be objected that although it may be necessary to establish the presence of a political culture of self-determination in order to be able to distinguish between national and ethnic groups, my definition is too narrow in its focus on political culture alone. Below, I consider why the presence of such a culture, together with self-identification, is sufficient to define nationhood. 

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