The Wider Context

Abstract

Nation-building, in the modern sense of the term, is a complex and long-term process. It embraces four aspects or dimensions of its fulfilment: geographical, cultural, political and psychological. Not all of these dimensions develop at an equal pace. Sometimes it is a kind of statehood, a concentrated power structure over a kindred people in a defined area, that provides the main integrative impetus; sometimes it is the language, standardised in written form, that represents the decisive step in the Identification of particular people as a separate ‘ethnic’ nation. Occasionally, it is a particular religious affiliation that constitutes the bond of cultural identity, similar to that of an ethnic nation.