Thought-Provoker: the difference between patriotism & nationalism

Nationalism and patriotism are terms often used interchangeably by media and political commentators alike, however, from a social psychological perspective they are viewed as different aspects of broader national identification.

From a social psychological perspective, patriotism reflects a pride in, and indeed, love for one’s country. Patriotism then, involves the emotionally positive side of national identification--the warm and fuzzy feeling (or the sense of gooey attachment) one gets from ones national identity (i.e., the hand on heart side of things).

Nationalism however, consists of a sense of arrogance and perceived superiority over other nations, and the desire to seek dominance over them. Although both patriotism and nationalism involve ingroup-favortism, nationalism involves derogation of the outgroup (i.e., other nations) while patriotism does not.

Therefore, patriotism can at times actually facilitate internationalist cooperation, while nationalism not only undermines such cooperation, it can decrease desire to initiate cooperative agreements in the first place (nationalism is isolationist and protectionist).

Nationalism then is all about home-nation first, even if it’s detrimental to other nations. Nationalism is associated with militaristic attitudes (and action) toward other nations. Nationalism is also associated with authoritarianism and ethnocentricity (both are very ugly characteristics antithetical to harmonious international relations).

Moreover, at the individual level, patriots are more likely to be diversity tolerant and hold other liberal attitudes than are nationalists.

When Trump goes on about patriotism in terms of his America-first model, what he is really referring to is building American nationalism.

The take home message: be a patriot by all means because most people have a desire to belong to a larger super-ordinate group (and patriotism can provide a healthy national self-concept), but don’t be a nationalist---it’s damn ugly and nothing good is likely to come from it…..