In my previous article, titled “The Purpose of Nations and the American Exception,” I discussed that the unique model of sovereignty and national purpose utilized by the United States of America stands alone in the world. In this American Model, the question of what defines an American is answered through ideological and philosophical principles, which are written in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. In this, America becomes what Thomas Paine once called “an asylum for mankind,” a nation which does not exclude on physical characteristics but rather on adherence to the ideals of its founding. Within that article, I stated that the American Model is unique in the world, and ought to be a great source of national pride, culture, and patriotism. It only makes sense, then, to give more detail about what the American model stands in contrast to, which for the purposes of this article may be termed the Old-World Model.
The Purpose of a Nation
Why does a country exist? The most simple answer is that a country exists because a group of people desire an organization to care for them and their descendants, and to ensure that their posterity, culture, and sovereignty endure through the ages. Therefore, as discussed in “The Purpose of Nations,” the primary purpose of any nation is to care for the people who define it.
To understand the principles that underpin the Old-World Model, it is first necessary to understand that identities, especially national identities, are inherently exclusive. All of the traditional understanding of nations is grounded in this fact: Since all nations are defined by people with a national identity, any nation is inherently exclusive of those who do not share that national identity.
The second principle of the Old-World Model is that nations are founded upon a people who have both a common ancestry and a common cultural experience. In other words, a national identity is the intersection of a cultural identity and a shared ancestry, which may be, although it is very different than the common modern use of that word, termed an ethnicity.
These two statements combined form the thesis that the Old-World Model relies on: “Nations have a nationality and nationalities are based in ethnicities (as defined in the previous paragraph), therefore all nations are inherently exclusive of those of other ethnicities. Thus, so that all peoples can be cared for, all distinct ethnicities significant enough to have nations have a natural right to their own nation-state, where they will not be at the mercy of a larger population.”
This understanding of nationhood historically dominant in the Old World provides a clear view of many of the people of these nations’ beliefs and actions, which would make no logical sense when approached from the American point of view on nationhood.
Applying This Understanding: Europe and Japan
The recent migration crisis in Europe has exposed much of interest when it comes to the traditional Old-World Model of nationhood: Underlying the migration crisis is a crisis of national identity. In 1800, 1900, 1950, or even 1980, the question of what it meant to be French, German, English, Spanish, Polish, etc. was one that could be simply answered: It was to be a member of a common ancestry and culture, it meant that you were a descendant of a people who had lived in that land for a thousand years or more, that you followed the culture that your ancestors and their countrymen had developed, and that your nation’s purpose was to ensure that in any number of years your children would still be the undisputed rulers of that land.
However, large migrations since the latter part of the 20th century and especially since the Syrian Civil War have presented a fundamental challenge to the identities of these nations. According to the United Kingdom’s Office of National Statistics, in the 2021 census there are entire areas of cities such as London, Leicester, and Birmingham where less than 5% of the inhabitants could be considered of a British ethnic group (English, Scottish, Welsh, Ulsterite). This trend is currently being repeated in France, Germany, and Italy as well, where in Germany 24% of the population has a non-German immigrant background, although numbers for France and Italy are more difficult to find due to the governments not recording those statistics on their censuses.
Japan is also in a similar situation. Disgusting racial violence and abuse has been reported in multiple Japanese cities, and mass protests and election losses, in large part due to Japanese anger over immigration that has resulted in the rise of Sanseitō and the fall of PM Ishiba from power.
Additional violence has occurred in Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and many other countries, a recent example, the Southport race riots that transpired last year.
The root of the problem, essentially, is that the political class of these nations considers the Old-World Model of nationhood to be outdated and morally evil, and they govern their countries as if they were based on the American model. However, a large part of the populations still thinks in terms of the Old-World Model, and truthfully no democratic vote was ever held to ask the citizens of the country whether they agreed with the decision to change the foundations of their countries. This divide breeds resentment that results in anti-foreigner sentiments and the rise of parties such as the AfD in Germany, which calls for a restriction of German citizenship to ethnic Germans.
Due to this mismatch of fundamental worldview, any sort of dialogue between the political class and the large segment of the population that considers their country built on an ethnicity is impossible. The ruling class thinks purely in American terms: Any suggestion that there were not many diverse ethnicities, cultures, and origins from all around the world involved in the creation of states like England, France, Japan, and Germany is racist and bigoted, since in America it is recognized that many different ethnic groups have made this country what it is. Any suggestion that the country ought to take care of the ethnic group that it was made to serve first is also racist, because in America no single ethnicity can really be pointed out as the single “American” ethnicity, and unfairly elevating one is racist. Any suggestion that the European and Asian countries in question have not been diverse and multicultural since their creations is racist, because America has been diverse since it was founded. The only problem is that the European ruling class does not rule America instead of Europe.
Against the European political class are the more traditional segments of the European people, who consider their nations to be built on the Old World Model to such a degree that it cannot be changed while still being the same country.
These two groups are engaged in what may be accurately termed a shouting match between two deaf men. When they say the same words, they mean completely different things- they cannot agree on the most fundamental aspect of a nation, who is a part of it and who is not. When the ruling class of Europe looks at the ethnic English, French, or Germans protesting against the feeling that they are becoming minorities in areas of their own country that they had dominated for thousands of years, they see racists, because in America it is considered racist. When the conservative segments of those populations look at their leadership, they see traitors and conspirators. When the European political class hears the conservatives, they dismiss them as racists who are attempting to rewrite the history of a country that was always diverse, because America has always had multiple ethnicities and it would be racist to rewrite American history to hide that. The conservative Europeans claim that the political class is trying to rewrite history, because in their view their nations’ histories have been dominated by one or several specific ethnic groups. When the conservatives claim that they have a right to ethnic self-determination as native peoples to their lands and that it violates their rights to deny them this and reduce their proportion of the population without their consent, the European ruling class claims that there is no such right, because in America there is no such right.
There is no end to this shouting match except violence of the most ugly, savage, and brutal kind that will make what is today evil and barbaric appear calm and restrained. Unless the peoples of Europe are given an honest choice, which they have been long denied, violent outbursts will only continue on their current trajectory of increase. It ought to be put to a vote in every major European nation, as well as Japan, whether they would prefer to be a multicultural, American-like nation and accept that immigration may make them minorities in certain areas of the country, consent to change and accept that their nations will be very different than they were a hundred or a thousand years ago, or maintain continuity and remain on the Old-World Model, even if that means that they will not be able to rapidly grow their population through migration, that their population and GDP may end up declining, and that they may not be able to maintain their present global power. The people of these countries believe that they have a right to self-determination, and, even if they ought not to have it, they still believe that they do, and, after all, the people are the only ones who matter. They must be given a choice as to whether they wish to exercise that right or relinquish it, being aware of the consequences of both decisions. Nothing but destruction lies along the path of the current status quo, where changes to the most fundamental parts of a country are being made without the explicit approval of its people.